


Indecent Rhythm

by Bardicsidhe (Scylla)



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Genre: American AU, Ballroom Dancing, Car Chases, First Kiss, First Time, High School, M/M, Post-Canon, Slow Burn, Sneaking Out, Teenage Drama, Threesome, heat exhaustion
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2004-12-17
Updated: 2004-12-17
Packaged: 2019-06-07 11:49:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 64,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15218510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scylla/pseuds/Bardicsidhe
Summary: Senior year, post-series. Set in America – come on, go with me, here. Téa has three weeks to teach Tristan and Joey how to dance. When a time conflict arises, she hands the reins over to Duke Devlin, who introduces the boys to a new kind of rhythm altogether.





	1. Chapter 1

It was the summer before senior year at Domino High. Spring's torrential downpours left everyone with a restless static energy, as if the lightning that struck the ground in April created an electric undercurrent in the teenage population.

It was summer now, and Téa Gardner was unsuccessfully trying to teach Joey Wheeler and Tristan Taylor to dance. "Keep your frame locked," she ordered. Téa stood behind Joey, guiding his movements with a hand curled at his shoulder and the other against the small of his back. He was pissed.

"I'm not a girl! Why does Tristan get to lead?"

"You can't both lead." Téa's tone was matter-of-fact. She swatted his fingers down over Tristan's fist. Both boys' knuckles were clenched tightly enough to make the skin white across the ridges. They made a battle out of even this, Téa noted with exasperation, just like they battled over everything else. "Stop whining. Look at your arms! Do you want to learn to do this the right way?"

The second story of Téa's home had been converted into her studio. Her bedroom was in a cramped cubicle on the western side of the open space, partitioned off with screens, with the bathroom beside it. Light flooded the rest of the space from large windows in every wall but the north wall, which was lined with mirrors and a practice _barre_. All of the windows were open and a fan hummed in one corner, doing little to combat the heat and humidity. Both boys had stripped down to only jeans - _and_ dress shoes, at Téa's insistence. She wore a white leotard with a ripped Domino High tee shirt knotted over the top.

"How did we end up doing this in the first place?" Tristan looked down at his slightly shorter 'partner,' one dark eyebrow arched.

"Girls," Joey mumbled.

"No, I don't think that's how."

"Fuck you, Tristan."

"No, that's not it either. Tell me again why I have to learn to dance? I forgot."

When Joey did little more than growl, Téa rolled her eyes and answered the question for him. "Because Joey lost a duel with Mai, and now he has to learn to dance in three weeks for some huge gala her family's throwing." She waved a finger over Joey's shoulder at the taller boy, "And since Serenity is visiting this summer, and there's nobody at home to be with her, she's going too. So _you_ have to learn to dance."

"So he gets to lead and I have to follow?" Joey protested. Tristan and Téa grinned at each other.

"Face it Joey. Mai's going to be doing the leading." Tristan poked his best friend's bare chest.

"But Serenity leads _you_ around by the nose already, Tristan!" Téa giggled in Joey's defense. This didn't quite have the effect she'd planned, as now Joey was staring hard up at Tristan with a "you'd better not be screwing my sister" scowl.

"She does not, Gardner!" Tristan retorted, hissing as Joey's grip tightened even more on his already screaming hand. "Give it a rest, will you? Before Joey amputates my fingers."

"All right," Téa was suddenly all business again, tossing strands of her fluffy brown bob behind her ears, "Honestly Joey, you _will_ get to lead. But it's Tristan's turn."

"Why can't we dance with you?"

"Yeah!" Tristan rubbed the circulation back into his hand.

The dancer dismissed both of them with an airy wave. "Because you both need help, and I can't be with both of you at once."

"That sounds kind of… **ow!** " Joey rubbed the back of his head where Téa's palm connected. Her blue eyes blazed with outraged virginity.

"Don't say it, Joey," she warned dangerously, "don't even _think_ it."

"Too late," Tristan laughed, "he already has."

In the riot that followed, nobody noticed the dark, sleek head that slowly bobbed over the plane of the floor as Duke Devlin ascended the dim stairwell to Téa's studio.

"Well, look at what we have here;" he drawled, amused, taking in the shirtless boys wrestling on the polished hardwood floor, "You call this dancing? I knew you were chasing a Wheeler, Tristan, but I guess I had the wrong one pegged."

"Shut up," Tristan grumbled, and went limp.

Joey bristled and abruptly shoved himself off of Tristan's chest. "You wanna come over here and say that to my face, pretty boy?"

"Temper, temper, little Joey," Duke waved a warning finger in eerily the same manner that Téa had just done, "and I wasn't speaking to you anyway. Who Tristan lusts after is his own business." He leaned on the railing and smirked at the lanky brunet in question, "isn't it, Tristan?"

Tristan glared, but otherwise said nothing. Duke's eyes slid closed, and he cocked his head to one side, smirk widening. "That's what I thought."

Joey started for Duke with a snarl – not particularly in defense of his best friend's honor, but more for the reason that he disliked the older boy's superior attitude in general. Any excuse was a good excuse to charge.

Besides. He expected Tristan to stop him before he got anywhere. Which he did.

"Lemme go! Lemme kick his ass for ya! It'll be a _pleasure_."

"Cool it, Joey!" Tristan tightened his grip on Joey's forearm until the other boy winced. He stared hard at Duke over his captive's head. "How'd _you_ know we came here to dance?"

"I have an exceptional gaydar."

" _Lemme at 'em! I'll kill 'em!_ "

"Oh, shut up, the three of you," Téa straightened from inspecting the stereo, a fresh disc speared on one fingertip, "and Duke – stop teasing them."

"Killjoy," Duke pouted, stepping around the railing. He passed by Tristan and his captive – now in a headlock – without so much as a second glance. The boys were so busy fighting with each other again that they paid him no mind as he joined Téa beside the speakers. He kept his voice below the roar of the industrial-sized fan and the shouts of the combatants. "Téa, you can't be serious. I'm supposed to be working with _them_? But look at them!" He flung one hand in disgust, "They know more about pounding each other's asses into hamburger than they know about—" A caterwaul – presumably Joey, who was the more vocal of the two – interrupted him. He grimaced. "Besides. They won't listen to me."

"Oh, they'll listen," Téa replied cheerfully, and snapped her head to the side to roar at her 'students.' "That's it! Cut it out you two, or I _won't_ show you how to dance, and let _Mai_ deal with you!"

They froze, blinking at each other with chagrin.

Satisfied, she turned back to Duke. "And besides. You won't be working with them on your own until next week. I need an extra teacher, because my family's taking the week to visit my grandparents in the north."

"Next _week_? Just how long do I have to work with them?"

"Every day. Two hours a day. Four hours on Saturday and Sunday."

"Two weeks of this? Téa, you're killing me."

"Three weeks, actually. As long as it takes 'til then."

It dawned on Duke, then. "Mai's family party." He could understand why the girl tried to pretend she didn't have a family for the most part. Unbelievably wealthy, but incredibly suffocating. She was twenty, he thought, but whenever she was home they still treated her like she was fifteen.

Téa nodded, the edges of her fluffy bob sweeping against her cheeks. "She tricked Joey into going – and Tristan got dragged into the whole thing, and neither one of them knows a thing about dancing."

"I do too," Joey protested, getting up from where he'd once again pinned Tristan to the floor, "I know it's dorky as hell. And I know Mai's gonna kill me if I can't do it."

Tristan followed after, apparently none the worse for wear, if a bit more damp and red-faced. He was rubbing the side of his neck. "Since Serenity's going to get dragged along anyway, I gotta make sure she's not bored."

"Dragged?" Duke teased, "Where Serenity is concerned, I would _hardly_ consider it an imposition."

"Shut up," Joey and Tristan blurted almost in unison – the former wearing his usual mastiff's protective glare, the latter rolling his eyes.

"Maybe I was wrong about you, after all. Not boyfriends, but twins." Green eyes flickered with mischief.

"I _meant_ that I wanted to make sure Serenity had a good time." Tristan chose to ignore the earlier jab, and threw a barring arm across Joey's chest when his best friend chose _not_ to.

"Of course she will. I'll be attending Mai's gala as well, and unlike you, I _can_ dance. Hm, maybe I won't help Téa teach you. That might be a conflict of personal interest."

"Yeah, 'cause we already _know_ how self-interested you are."

"Ouch! I'm stung! Big words, Tristan. Where'd you learn that one?"

"Off the back of the can of whoop-ass he and I are gonna—"

" **Enough!** "

They all fell silent, staring in surprise at the source of the exclamation.

Téa stood with her fists on her hips, delicate chin at an aggressive upward tilt, glaring at the company of infantile males. "I meant what I said! If there's _any_ more fighting, then I _will_ wash my hands of this whole thing. I'm only doing this because you _asked_ me."

"I'm not doing it anyway," Duke threw his hands up, spinning on his heel, "because they're impossible. I'm not going to waste my time."

"Leave and you'll regret it."

"Oh yeah?"

"Remember why you're here in the first place?"

Duke halted at the top of the stairs. The ponytail twitched. He looked over his shoulder, where the two other boys gazed at him curiously, Téa triumphantly. "That's _blackmail_ , Téa!"

"You should choose your audience more wisely next time," The girl's full, glossy peach lips curled up in a superior smile.

"I trusted you!"

"And you can _still_ trust me. _If_ you agree to help."

"That's not trust! That's coercion!"

"Well then, go ahead and leave. Maybe it won't turn out as bad as you think."

Aside from the conversation, two pairs of brown eyes met. Eyebrows rose in silent question, followed by slow smirks of recognition. "Dude, she's got something on you, doesn't she?" Tristan turned back to grin.

" _No_ ," Duke retorted, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. He stared at Téa suspiciously for a few moments, then sighed. "All right. I'll _help_."


	2. Chapter 2

"Look. First thing you _have_ to understand is that Mai's parents are rich," Duke explained the next morning. The day was overcast and muggy when the group of four met in Téa's studio, but thankfully the clouds blocking the sun kept the temperature of the room to a bearable level. Everyone sprawled out on the floor around the stereo in various degrees of relaxation.

"Ya mean they've both got sticks up their asses," Joey rephrased helpfully. Duke rolled his eyes.

"…Which _means_ that they're not fans of the kind of dancing that goes on at the high school prom."

Joey spluttered indignantly. "Hey, just 'cause _you're_ out of high school already doesn't mean—!"

"—I don't think he was trying to pick on us, Joey," Tristan cut in.

"He's too afraid of _me_ to try anything like that." Téa smiled. Duke's lips twitched, but said nothing. She picked up where he left off. "So we're going to show you what I was trying to show you yesterday. How to waltz. Foxtrot, if we get that far, but definitely waltz."

"What about all that stuff with the sequins and the babes in slinky dresses? When're we gonna learn that?" Joey straightened from leaning back on his hands and flexed his wrists. "That stuff doesn't look gay."

"Your partner has to _know_ those dances first, Joey," Duke explained with more patience than he'd shown in two days, "Serenity certainly doesn't, and I'm certain Mai doesn't either. You _can_ lead an inexperienced partner in a fairly decent waltz. But a samba? Or a tango? Hardly."

"Hey, how do you know all this stuff?" Tristan quirked an eyebrow suspiciously. The dark-haired boy _had_ been picking on them earlier about learning to dance, after all.

Téa and Duke exchanged glances. "Competition requires mastery of at least three Latin dances, as well as three traditional ballroom dances."

Tristan and Joey both sat back, gazes flicking between the slender girl and the equally willowy boy. Téa arched an eyebrow at them. "What? He was willing to learn, and my first partner moved away last year. So I taught him." She poked Duke fondly, and he flashed a sheepish grin that looked utterly out of place on his usually smug features. "We wiped the floor with the competition, last time."

Silence stretched.

"…Whoa." Joey managed at last.

"Well," Tristan backed him up, grinning, "if Téa could teach _you_ , then she should be able to teach _us_ easy."

"We'll see," Duke smirked, "but if you're such a prodigy, maybe you ought to be _my_ student first. I've never taught anyone how to dance before."

"What's that supposed to mean? You think I'm stupid or something?" Joey demanded angrily.

"Well, Tristan doesn't have two left feet after all."

"…I swear, you start that dog shit again, and you're gonna be in for some serious a—" The blond broke off at Téa's glare, and dropped his eyes, rubbing the back of his head furiously. "Fine."

Tristan snickered, and Joey swatted him. Duke rolled his eyes for the second time. "Téa…"

Whatever he intended to say drowned in the sudden roar of rain striking the roof. Four pairs of eyes turned up, studying the rafters.

"Let's get going," Téa leaned back to shuffle through the pile of compact discs she'd assembled for today, "at least it'll be a lot cooler in here now." The rest of her company grumbled good-naturedly, but the rain interrupting their argument reminded them that time was of the essence, and they all got to their feet. Duke waited until the music started and Téa came back to claim her partner, before he led Tristan away from the others.

"So who gets to lead?" Tristan grinned.

"First, I want to know how much Téa has worked with you." The older boy seemed all business now, tone brisk.

"Oh…" The sudden change of demeanor flustered the brunet a little. "For about three days."

"You know the basic steps?"

"I think so…"

"She made you dance with the stick." Duke's bare arms rose, folded into a position Tristan remembered, miming the proper posture for the leader. The second day, Téa presented her students with a pair of broomsticks, and forced them to stagger through the steps with the damn thing clutched awkwardly across their elbows.

"Yeah…"

"And you whacked Joey with it at least once, didn't you?"

"Y—hey!"

"Sorry," Duke snickered at Tristan's glare, "I couldn't resist. Knowing you two…it was a given. Don't worry! If it's any consolation – I whacked Téa with mine the first time."

"You did?"

"Well, not on purpose, but yeah. Got her right on the back of the head. And if you tell her I told you, I'll kill you."

The idea of suave, self-possessed Duke whapping Téa on the head with _anything_ – let alone a broomstick – was so hysterical that Tristan had to slap one hand over his mouth to stifle his laughter. It broke the nervous tension about the new arrangement quite nicely, and as the older boy led him through the usual warm-up, he had to admit that he preferred this setup. Duke might not have been a professional teacher, but he knew what he was doing, and he also knew how to slow down his movements enough for his student to follow.

His mouth was a little harder to deal with, however.

"How do you _manage_ to be so stiff? I thought monkeys were supposed to be agile."

Tristan bristled, but didn't have the time to retort before Duke moved on.

"I thought you said you could _count_ to three."

"Will you shut the hell up?"

"Don't put your heel down! You have to move on the balls of your feet, or you'll never be fast enough to keep up with the music."

Tristan looked down at his feet in despair. "I'll fall over!"

"No you won't. It'll feel funny at first, but I _promise_ you'll get used to it. This isn't the high school prom. It's not all about rocking back and forth and sucking on someone's face. Here…stop. _Stop_." And then Tristan was expected to freeze, let Duke walk around him and correct whatever he was doing wrong, and move back into the rhythm of the music when he said it was okay.

It was degrading, letting Duke order him around like this, but he put up with remarkably good humor. A quick occasional look across the room at how Téa and Joey were progressing registered that the blond boy was getting the raw end of his instructor's personality too, but he seemed just as resigned to the situation as Tristan.

And thus went the rest of the most humiliating – and possibly the most constructive – week of their lives.


	3. Chapter 3

"I'm _never_ going to get this! I can't go to this stupid party – I'll step on Serenity or something and break her foot!"

"I didn't know guys worried as much as you do, Tristan," Téa snickered from her side of the room, where she was teaching Joey the right way to guide his partner.

It was Sunday, the last day Téa would spend with them for two weeks. Tomorrow she would be on her way north to visit her grandparents, leaving both boys with Duke until just before the gala. The weather outside had cleared again, sunny and bright, and the studio was already sweltering though it was only eight in the morning. The weather felt totally out of keeping with Joey's mood. He could have done better with the heavy pressure and tension of another thunderstorm.

"Joey! Let's get one thing straight." Téa said flatly, "When you're dancing with someone, you are _dancing_. You are _not_ looking for their bra size."

"Oi, Téa, I wasn't doing anything like that!"

"Stay in your own space, then! Keep your arms locked or I'll lock them _for_ you."

"Ya promise?" Joey smirked, and ducked too late to avoid the open palm that smacked against the side of his head. "OW! What'd ya do _that_ for!"

"Don't even think things like that," Téa admonished, tone flat.

"But you don't know what I was thinking!"

Duke snorted, having stopped for the moment to snatch a drink of water. "When you think with your hormones, _anyone_ can tell what you're thinking, Joey." He leaned against a chipped, pink enameled filing cabinet crowded against the far unoccupied wall, elbows folded on the top as he nursed his water bottle.

"You're gonna regret that one, dice boy!"

"He's got a point, Joey," Tristan grinned, standing a little away from Duke, hip pressed against the balance bar mounted to the mirrors.

"You're ALL against me!"

"Just think of it as friendly advice, little Joey," Duke teased, bangs and water bottle flipping in opposite directions as he waved the latter for emphasis, "after all, now that you _know_ that you think with your balls, you can rectify the—Tristan?" he turned back to look at the brunet, who was doubled over, coughing on the water he'd just inhaled.

" _Dammit!_ Geez Duke, you gotta warn me first."

If his partner hadn't snatched a stranglehold on Joey's hand and shoulder just then, he would have thrown himself at the other two boys. He couldn't help feeling just a little betrayed – his best friend didn't have the right to laugh at his expense unless Joey was laughing too. _Especially_ not at a joke made by the slick older boy who openly made it his purpose in life to get into Serenity's pants. 'Why aren't YOU punching him out for me?' he wanted to demand from Tristan. The brunet had always been willing to go to the mat for him before – why wasn't he now?

"Har har, yuk it up, you two," Joey growled, settling for an angry glare, and looked down at Téa to offer an apology. She was looking up at him, hand settled comfortably in his again, glossy lips pursed in thought. Something in the pair of round blue eyes made Joey suddenly anxious to check if his fly was open. But that wasn't right. She wasn't looking at his crotch, she was looking at his face, and the only zipper open there was his mouth. Did he think out loud? Had she heard him? "What?" He asked, brow furrowing in agitation.

Apparently she'd been doing some deep thinking, because his question startled her more than he expected. "What? What do you mean, 'what'? Come on, we're wasting time. Wait. I need a drink." She broke away from him, back to the long bench under the windows, and picked up one of the bottles of chilled water waiting for them. The condensation ran down in rivulets, and she pressed it to her forehead, closing her eyes.

Joey followed her, glancing over his shoulder at Tristan and Duke. They were focused on each other again, chatting over sips of their drinks, not paying attention to what had just happened on the other side of the room. His expression darkened. Some friends.

"Hey, Téa?" He asked, coming up to her shoulder. She had her back almost to him, but he could see that her eyes were closed, the cool water bottle pressed to the side of her neck now.

"Yeah, Joey? You want something to drink too? I can't believe it's gotten this hot already." She leaned over and snagged another one, tossing it to him in a smooth arc.

He caught it, letting out a soft breath at the splash of condensation on the inside of his arms. "You okay?" he blurted, before he could think of a smooth segue way, and then rummaged frantically for a disclaimer. "I mean, it's really miserable, and we've been doin' this for a week. I just want ya to know that if you need a break, it's okay, we can quit. Ya did enough for me already…"

Téa smiled a little, tossing her head in denial. "You're sweeter than I thought, Joey Wheeler. I'm fine – I'm the one with the audition for a dance college next summer, remember? A little heat's not going to stop me."

"I just wanted to make sure you were okay." Joey repeated, lamely, pretty sure he was being led right around whatever was really bugging her. He never did know how to talk to girls. He thought he was pretty smart, but they made him look like a dunce, especially when it came to talking about deep stuff. "…Are you? I mean, really."

"I'm okay, really." She turned a little more and patted his arm, the palm of her hand still cool and slightly sticky from the sweat of her water bottle. "Stop worrying about me. I'm tougher than you three guys put together."

"Yeah, I know that," Joey grinned, "Damn steel magnolia. You and Mai make us guys look bad."

"I try," Téa chuckled, and reached over, popping the cap off of Joey's water. "now get a drink, and let's get back to work."

"What's up next on the agenda?" He asked, realizing that he actually was thirsty, and eagerly sucked on the contents of his bottle.

"I'm not going to do much, since I won't be here tomorrow, and it's not a good idea to get you started on something and then duck out."

"Figured that," Joey swiped the back of his wrist across his mouth.

"So we'll do something simple. How about if I show you how to pivot?"

"Pivot?"

"Well, you don't see dancers just moving around in one spot all the time, do you?" At Joey's blank look, Téa sighed. Whatever had been bothering her appeared to have evaporated, and she was back to brisk, stern teacher-mode. "They turn, Joey. If you just keep moving back and forth in the same spot, it's going to be—"

"—Boring as hell," Joey finished, and his teacher nodded.

"So I'll show you how to do what I've been getting you ready for – you're going to lead."

"Lead? But you just _showed_ me how to lead!"

"No, I showed you how to hold your frame. Now you're going to learn what to do with it." She caught his wrist, hardly giving him the opportunity to put his drink down, before leading him back to the open floor. Their other two companions were deep in discussion by now, Duke having moved away from the file cabinet to lean against the rail next to Tristan.

Their voices were low and intense, Joey noted, and Tristan's hands were out of his pockets, flashing in rapid movement the way they always did when he was really into something. One hand was turned up, the index finger of the other tapping at the center of his palm for emphasis.

Duke's eyes never left the younger boy's face, Joey also noted, to which his best friend appeared oblivious. It jangled a vibe that irritated him. He wrote it off as something dumb – Duke just had the ability to look like he was listening. He always made whoever he was talking to feel like the only person in the room. It didn't mean anything. He was just listening, not staring.

"Hey, are you two quitting for the day, or what?" Téa demanded, and her voice broke Joey's concentration, making him jump. She glared pointedly at Duke, who raised his head abruptly at the tone of her voice and caught her eyes. He ducked. Tristan shot him a sideways glance, and looked at Téa as well, shrugging.

"There's something up with his transmission," Tristan explained sheepishly, thumbing at Duke, who nodded. "Sorry, Téa. We'll quit slacking."

"You'd better," Joey retorted, voice tighter than usual, "my sister's countin' on _both_ of ya."

Both of the boys across the room suddenly looked very guilty, and pushed away from the rail to get back to work. Téa stopped the music, restarting the disc from the beginning, and returned to her partner, effectively forcing his focus back onto her.

She looked even more worried than she had earlier, but since he didn't want to start another lame discussion about whether she was 'okay' or not, Joey held his tongue and concentrated on the lesson. "So what's all this stuff about me leadin'?" He started, smiling.

"All right. Where I put your hands is going to be important. You're _not_ trying to check if I've got a bra on."

"Eh, sorry about that," Joey apologized, "I wasn't really tryin' to grope ya."

"Angle your hand down a little bit." She waited until his palm slid into the right place, grimacing as the rough calluses of his hand snagged in her shirt. "There. Right there. Just under my shoulder blade. You feel it, right?"

"Yeah, and _not_ your bra!" Joey crowed triumphantly, making a point of ignoring the snickers from across the room.

"Okay, good. Remember that. You're going to use that hand to push me wherever you want to go. You're the boss…but just here," She let go of his hand to swat his shoulder when her partner's smile grew smug. Absorbed in what they were doing now, they hardly noticed when their friends stopped once again to watch them.

"Use the pressure to guide me forward or backward. Oh, it's not that hard, really!" Téa flashed a reassuring smile when Joey fumbled in confusion, unusually stiff now.

"But this _is_ hard, Téa," Joey protested, "I dunno if I'm supposed to be pushin' or pullin' or _what_ now."

"Okay," the other girl said, stepping back to assess the situation, "then switch positions. I'll lead _you_ , and you can see what you're supposed to do."

"But girls don't lead!"

"Hey! Don't _make_ me go all feminist on your butt, Wheeler," Téa snickered, and gripped her partner's hand securely in her own. "Here. My hand goes under your shoulder blade like this." she rested her palm in the proper position, fingers angled downward toward the small of his back. "Put your hand on my shoulder, the way I usually do yours."

"I'm not wearin' a bra, just so ya don't hafta check," Joey smirked as he did what he was told.

Téa swatted him again, harder this time. " _Focus_ ," she ordered.

Joey focused. After a few false starts, he settled down, and realized that she _was_ right, and he realized that it wasn't about dragging his partner across the floor, but just a subtle nudge. More like a warning. Yeah, okay, he could do that. Like yelling 'heads up!' when a basketball bounced off the rim.

His left hand, he found out, was no slouch either. Its job was to turn his partner, pushing or pulling just a little one way or the other. Before long, Téa had him moving in a little circle, and then a bigger one, and then broke away, grinning. "Okay, now _you_ lead," she spread her hands, "you can do it, just do what I did."

He could, and he did.

It felt _great_.

For about three minutes, Joey forgot about being mad at his friends, forgot about ferreting out whatever was bothering Téa, and thoroughly enjoyed himself. The music sucked – okay, so he wasn't exactly into hoity-toity classical waltzes, but the way they whirled around the floor more than made up for the missing drums and electric guitars.

* * *

Meanwhile, Duke was trying to explain the niceties of Latin rhythm to Tristan. The brunet had a discomfiting amount of grace when he put his mind to it, and a naturally dominant personality. As such, once he'd gotten the general idea, he had _no_ problem leading. He was a little _too_ good, as a matter of fact, Duke admitted with a grumble. His student might have been taking to waltzing like a duck to water, but the very fact that he'd improved _so_ much in such a short time was cause for jealousy.

To put Tristan off-kilter a little and re-establish his own superiority, Duke led him into a conversation on the different kinds of Latin dances – about which the younger boy admittedly knew very little.

"The rumba is _not_ just a dance, all right? It's a…" Duke searched for the right words, and in the end, cribbed from a saying he'd heard on the subject. "…a vertical expression of a horizontal desire."

"What, you mean sex?"

"Yes, genius," the older boy snorted, "it's a pantomime of two people having sex – the man's part is aggressive, the woman's defensive. It's a lot of…well… 'tease and run,' that's what they call it."

"Sounds like fun," Tristan smirked.

"Yeah, it is," Duke smirked back, "and it's easy to learn, but it's hard to do really well. I'm not much of a teacher, and I sure as hell can't _teach_ you to feel the right way. Besides, you need a girl partner for that kind of thing."

"Why?"

"Well, because if it was two guys, it would look kind of weird, right?" Duke replied. As much time as they'd spent together in the past few days, Tristan noticed the other's subtle shift away from him. His voice usually only tightened like that when they were both tired and frustrated and Tristan had screwed up something. It was confusing.

"I guess so."

"Téa's busy with Joey, or I could have her show you how. She's _really_ good at it." Duke's eyes were just a little too fixed on the blue-eyed girl; tone just a little too preoccupied for comfort.

"It's not a big deal." The disappointment didn't quite strain out of Tristan's reply.

Silence stretched as they crossed the floor and sat on the bench, nursing their bottles of water. Tristan leaned over, elbows on his knees, and watched Joey dancing with Téa. She'd stopped them again and changed into a pair of silvery strappy high-heels that she was planning on wearing to the gala. His best friend led Téa expertly through the waltz. They stepped out together, sweeping along the floor and circling one another with almost the same grace as the dancers on the recording of Duke and Téa's last competition.

What was more, Joey was really smiling. Grinning like a maniac. He looked like he couldn't get enough of the air rushing past them. The expression struck Tristan first – the blond teenager had a smile a mile wide when he was really pleased with something, and the dazzling row of white teeth was exposed now in a totally unguarded show of joy.

He was getting lost in the fascinating changes of expression. Joey's smile went a little tender and grateful when Téa complemented him on something he'd done well. His eyes narrowed in extreme concentration, or his cheeks flushed with embarrassment when he led his partner back from an under-arm turn and got a handful of Téa's chest instead.

Tristan came back to himself with a jerk.

_What?_

As always, they did without their shirts in this overheated room, and the sweat stood out in white shines on the ridges of Joey's collarbone and the muscles cording his back. He looked like a pants ad from a mail-order catalog…only half-naked…

And hotter.

Goddamn it, _sweatier!_ He meant _sweatier!_

He caught himself with a mental curse, and looked away. It was just a glitch. He took a deep breath, and looked back in a minute.

Trying not to think of what he'd just seen proved impossible. More and more, he was drawn back to studying the shift of muscles underneath his friend's skin, and the way Joey's long legs blurred with the bold, sweeping steps of the waltz, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

Worse still, the brunet's body was responding to Joey's with definite and loud approval. He felt his stomach sink, the same way it sank when he saw the sections of manga his older sister would show him to make him blush. The hollow feeling was a good one, he knew, but he also knew what would come next, and squeezed his eyes shut to try and stem the inevitable.

The bottle sitting on the bench between his legs was very cold against his thigh. He shivered, and snatched it away, turning it between his hands instead.

Tristan had no idea he was being watched. Duke's hand slid down his back, and he jerked back, adrenaline flooding his body. "Hm?" He rumbled, for lack of anything else to say.

"You looked overheated there. Are you okay?"

"Me? Yeah…just…tired, I guess."

"Me too. I don't know how Téa does it," Duke turned back, watching the slim, leggy girl in question and her partner circle the floor. He took a slow pull at his bottle. "She must have calves like steel, that's all I can say."

"You mean you don't know?" Tristan tore his gaze away from Joey and Téa to grin at the older boy.

Duke gave him a dubious look. "What d'you mean?"

"Well, I don't know. It's just that, you know, you guys danced together for a long time…" Tristan flushed again, for an entirely different reason. Once again, his mouth had gotten ahead of his brain. Not that it would have mattered much if one managed to catch up with the other, considering that they were both obsessed with the same thing anyway.

"You think I slept with her," Duke finished flatly, staring at him intensely now, green eyes narrow.

"What? No! It's just the way you talked about the Rumba—"

"—well I _didn't_ , okay? We're _friends_. It's _better_ that way. I know you guys all think that I'd jump in bed with anything in a skirt—"

"—I never said I thought that!"

"—and hell, sometimes I wish it _was_ that way, because then at least I'd be doing what you all _expect_ out of me, but I don't. And don't you _dare_ tell Téa we talked about this. No, wait." He stood up abruptly, snatching his thin black tank top from the bench and yanking it over his head, "On second thought, _ask_ her if we slept together. So I can watch her smack you, good and hard."

Tristan was on his feet in a second, reaching out to grab the other boy's wrist, not realizing how loud their voices had gotten. "Will you calm down? Look, I'm sorry! I never meant that you—"

" _Save_ it." Duke snapped his arm out of reach, slung his duffel bag over his shoulder, and stormed out into the hall.

Tristan turned in time to see Téa let go of Joey and sprint out the door after Duke. When the door slammed, he looked across the room at his best friend.

"What'd you do, pal?" Joey asked, coming over to stand beside him, "I don't think I've ever seen that guy so mad."

"I really screwed up," Tristan replied, and didn't look at him – how did someone _look_ at someone whose ass they'd been staring at for a solid two minutes? An ass that under normal circumstances, he'd never looked at for more than a few seconds?

An ass that _was_ a really _nice_ ass, now that he mentioned it?

"You guys had a fight? What, ya tell him his car's a piece of shit or something?" Joey rubbed the back of his neck. His gaze flipped alternately between Tristan and the door, beyond which, raised voices could be heard.

"If I told you, you'd just smack me."

"Try me. Geez, it's not like the guy's my _best friend_ or something," The blond stopped the nervous eye-flicking and gave Tristan a significant look, brows arched.

So, haltingly, Tristan told him the story.

Joey's hand connected with the back of his head before he finished.

Tristan's teeth snapped painfully shut as his head flew forward. "OW! Shit, what'd you do _that_ for?" He growled, rubbing the back of his neck and knowing full well what it was for.

"How the hell could ya _say_ something like that about Téa?" Joey demanded angrily, and whapped him again for good measure. "She's not like that! I don't give a crap whatDuke says he does, but you know Téa…she'd never do something like that!"

"I'm sorry, man! I wasn't thinking!" Tristan ducked as the heel of the other boy's hand dusted over the top of his head.

"Damn right you weren't thinking," Joey snorted, "'Sides, where'd ya get that idea? She was dancin' with me right before you guys mixed it up, and you don't see _me_ wantin' to sleep with her."

He was right, Tristan realized. Where _had_ he made that connection?

Joey went on, oblivious. "I was havin' a great time out there, ya know? Even though _I_ wasn't thinkin' about _sex_ or anything like _you_ do, I guess." Joey jabbed a finger into Tristan's chest, who _oomphed_.

Tristan's hand rose to shove Joey's finger away and rub the spot where it'd been, aching faintly and fading now. "I dunno. You're Téa's partner – maybe that's why it's different."

"What? Tristan…you're _Duke's_ partner. What's your problem? I thought you said the guy does nothin' but piss you off."

Joey shook his head, pushing straggles of sweaty blond hair out of his eyes with a grunt of frustration. He stared at Tristan.

Tristan stared back. He'd been listening and getting mired deeper and deeper the whole time the other boy talked. The dots Joey unknowingly connected were incongruous, outrageous, impossible, and…and…he didn't know what to say. His mind flailed in a panic for something to put off Joey. Just…just _something_ …

Joey's lips parted slightly, dark brown eyes widening as a warm flush started across the bridge of his nose. "…Tr—"

"What? He _does_ piss me off." He interrupted, seizing on his self-preservation instinct when all else failed. His fists doubled over, adrenaline flooding his already over-taxed system. It was a familiar feeling – a feeling from the bad, old days, when he could get so wound up that he'd pick fights just to blow off steam. "Serenity…" he croaked, half in explanation, and half simply to remind himself that she existed. Her existence was the reason he wanted to kill Duke on a regular basis.

The reason why, under normal circumstances, he would not have been staring at her big brother's backside.

"What _about_ Serenity?" Joey asked, nonplussed. He didn't seem to be making the connection either. Too confused to glare.

"She…came up while we were talking," Tristan lied. He realized belatedly that really, she had very little to do with the situation at hand. It scared him to think that she'd become an excuse to dismiss his friendship with Duke.

" _That_ made you think about sex?" The confusion in Joey's face was obvious, but after ten seconds of hard staring, it was just as obvious that he was just going to have to stay confused. With a sigh and a philosophical shrug, the blond apparently decided not to get angry about it and shoved Tristan in the chest again. "Quit thinking about Serenity," he grunted, and Tristan laughed a little harder than he should have; said he'd try not to.

Duke and Téa were still out in the hall, but the studio was quiet. Tristan sat down on the bench under the windows and leaned back, turning his head until he could see over the sill. The shadows were just starting to gather under the trees, and every eastbound windshield flashed enough to blind. Hard to believe that it was probably just a half hour or so before noon.

"What d'ya think's going on out there?" Joey wondered as he sagged bonelessly on the bench a comfortable arm's length away. He peered at the closed door.

"I don't know, and I don't care," Tristan grumbled. Duke was such a damn drama queen. Who had the bigger problem here? After all, the guy said he _hadn't_ been sleeping with Téa. So Tristan's problem was a little more serious, he thought, but nobody saw _him_ throwing a fit. "Maybe he'll stop being pissed off if I go out there and let him whack me too."

"Maybe." Joey shrugged one shoulder, elbows up on the sill of the next window. He still had his shirt off and the noon sun was just barely brushing the back of his neck, muscles bunched up in his shoulders.

"You think it'd work?"

"Probably not."

Sensing disinterest, Tristan let it drop. He stood up, and leaned over and dug the loose basketball jersey he'd worn earlier out of his duffel. "I think I'd better go."

"But we're not done," Joey rolled his head up from its lazy lean against the sill. He blinked at Tristan, watching the other boy with his usual intensity. Looking up at him as he stretched the bottom of his shirt down over his hips, Tristan felt caught. Like Joey could see right through him; could see everything about him. Did he know where Tristan's eyes had been ten minutes ago? Did he know how all this waiting was making him into a ball of nerves?

"You aren't. Your teacher doesn't wanna belt you in the mouth."

"We could switch," Joey offered, and then grinned. "Nah, 'cause Téa probably wants to belt ya in the mouth now, too."

"Gee, thanks," Tristan retorted sarcastically, and started for the back exit. The doorway to the set of stairs in the rear was tucked in the corner of the north wall, just shy of the mirrors, and led down to the family's garage and driveway facing the alley.

"What am I supposed to tell 'em?" Joey yelled after him, not getting up.

"Tell 'em that I'm sorry."

The door thudded shut behind him.

Joey waited in the silence afterward for a long moment. Then the engine of the motorcycle down on the driveway fired up, and his eyes widened. He'd forgotten – Tristan was his ride! He snatched his shirt and bag and bolted out of the studio. _"Don't leave without me!"_


	4. Chapter 4

The greenish LED display on the dash blinked 6:28 before Tristan killed the motor in the alley behind Téa's home once more on Sunday evening. The neighborhood where she lived was noisy with passing cars and people in the last-minute scurry for home and dinner. Every window was rolled up tight, and most of the faces he saw on the way there were grim and exhausted with the heat.

He threw his right leg over the saddle of his bike and popped the transmission into neutral. The machine rolled easily forward as he walked it the last few feet down the alley to the dancer's driveway. Her family was home, but the lights were still brightly burning upstairs in the studio – maybe she was packing for the trip on Monday.

The back entry was wide open, spilling polished yellow light down on the driveway. He was so busy staring at it that he nearly fell when his front wheel bumped into something solid. The car he'd run into jounced in its shocks, and Tristan staggered. He had a thing against touching other people's vehicles, but with the choice between groping someone's ride or possibly getting crushed between a chrome bumper and a hot Honda muffler, his hand instinctively lashed out to grab the corner of the trunk.

It landed on the point of a high Cadillac tailfin.

Tristan took a moment for a closer look, letting the saddle of his bike lean against his hip. Even in the dark of the alley, the car was silvery pale, and in better light Tristan assumed correctly that it'd be mint green. The original paint of course, and in pristine condition.

Duke's car.

Lucky bastard.

Wait. He was still here?

Violating another one of his rules, Tristan let his fingertips trace the chrome vee on the trunk lid. He felt a pang of guilt. If Duke was here, he'd have to deal with what had happened earlier today. The only reason that he was there at _all_ was to pick up the duffel bag he'd forgotten – and he'd waited until this late to do it to avoid the possibility of the older boy being there.

He could just leave it and get it tomorrow. He'd be back anyway.

But then, so would Duke. And then Téa wouldn't even be there to mediate in case dice boy was still offended and tried to take his head off.

He had the opportunity – why pass it up?

Gently, he turned his bike and maneuvered it in beside the Cadillac, then lifted off his helmet and set it on the saddle. He climbed the stairs to the back entry. Téa would be leaving Duke a key to this door while she was gone.

Because of the heat, the door was propped wide open with a huge floor fan – it was new, he hadn't seen it before – sucking in the relatively cooler night air. It impeded any further movement without hurdling it and possibly giving himself away. He could see his duffel, shoved under the bench across the room, beneath the windows.

He could hear the sound of an argument inside, but the fan drowned out the words until all that could be heard were the high notes and the angry pitch. A painted screen Téa added on the left side of the door blocked his view of the room. He identified the voices as those of his two dance 'teachers,' but really, he would have been surprised if it hadn't been.

It sounded to him like Téa was trying to be reasonable – though the fragments seemed loose and nervous. Duke, on the other hand, was completely unhinged. His voice was naturally hoarse, keeping his volume lower than the girl's, but he still managed to be pretty loud.

Then he made out one clear word at the end of a long string, as conveniently as though the fan had hiccupped just for him to let the buzz of voices solidify. But everyone could recognize their own name. Clear as day. He'd heard it. It was Téa who said it – the young brunet dancer's voice was pitched to carry. Tristan didn't catch anything other than an aggravated rumble in reply.

Though moving forward was already difficult because of the fan, Tristan suddenly had no desire to move from the spot. Why had his name come up? Was Duke _still_ hacked about the morning? Tristan had never known the guy to hang onto grudges, so what was the big deal? Was he waiting for an apology?

Hadn't he already gotten one?

Well, in a way he had, Tristan admitted, but not really. He'd reflexively apologized. While that was good enough for things like stepping on someone's foot or bumping into them at the library, he suspected that he'd have to make more of an effort. But what was the big _deal_ , anyway? So he'd made a dumb connection. So sue him – everybody did once or twice in their lives. So why was Duke so damned upset?

The argument inside had gotten worse, and now Téa no longer sounded reasonable. Gingerly, Tristan rested his hand on top of the fan, and eased his right leg over the frame, teeth gritted, just like getting on a bike. When his ears cleared the roaring wind tunnel to the other side, the voices were suddenly frighteningly clear.

"I don't want to see anybody get hurt!" Téa. "I can't leave you guys _alone_ now – God knows what'll happen! You could kill each other!"

"You don't think I can behave myself?" Duke retorted, scalding enough to peel paint off the wall, "You and Tristan are two of a kind!"

"I don't believe for _one_ minute that you know what you're doing, Duke Devlin. I care about them! But I care about you too and I think Joey might—"

"I know. You _told_ me already."

Frozen in place straddling the fan, Tristan suddenly entertained the image of Duke, hands gripping the sides of his head, lips pulled back in an angry grimace.

"Why?" Duke demanded, out of the blue. Behind the word were unspoken others, but Tristan couldn't make sense of them.

"It won't always be this way," Téa's voice was still tight, but softer, "just let me make sure. If there's one person I don't want to get hurt, it's—"

"—Me. Yeah, I know."

It was hard, standing on the balls of his feet in order to get his crotch clear of the fan, and by the time Tristan gauged it for an entrance, his legs were tired and clumsy.

He didn't hold his foot high enough on the way over, stumbled, and crashed to the floor in a heap, taking the fan with him.

The former combatants broke off abruptly, and from his position stretched out with one shoulder and most of his face ground into the floor, he could feel the tremor of their steps as they ran to see what had knocked over the fan. They stopped right in front of him, but the fan kept going, thrumming between Tristan's legs like an angry wasp. Duke untangled him and hauled him to his feet.

"Tristan?" Téa bounded to a stop in front of them, a few scant seconds behind the older boy, voice bouncing with the same force as her generous chest.

"What the hell were you _doing_?" Duke demanded, eyes narrowed.

"Falling on my ass," Tristan replied, when his jaw cooperated at last. He rolled his shoulder and felt it pop. Ouch.

"Like _that's_ anything new," Duke retorted, but turned aside when his companion laid her hand on his arm, and they exchanged a long look that made Tristan uncomfortable. He could guess what they were saying to each other. _Do you think he heard us?_

"I came to get my duffel bag," he reassured them, tone as natural as he could manage, and pointed to where it lay slouched against the opposite wall. When both pairs of eyes turned away from him, he sucked in an uneasy breath. "I heard somebody yelling from downstairs and thought…y'know…I'd wait until it was over." That was atypical Tristan behavior and he knew it, and when the blue and the green eyes met his again, he knew that _they_ knew it.

"I didn't think you'd be here," he added, looking at Duke.

The other boy said nothing.

"Well, you may as well get it," Téa replied, when the silence started drawing out, and moved aside, "we're done. It wasn't anything, Tristan."

He nodded, and slid past them, ignoring the silence behind him because they were probably _looking_ at each other again. He bent to pick up his practice bag.

"I should be going anyway," he heard Duke saying to Téa. She murmured back, too low for Tristan to make out the words, but her tone was apologetic. Tristan turned in time to see the older boy shaking his head.

"Hey, don't leave on my account," Tristan shrugged, walking toward them with the duffel slung over his shoulder, "I'm leaving."

"No good-bye?" Téa spread her hands, smiling at him. He wondered, then, if Duke had told her what he'd said, but he decided not to worry about it. When he didn't move immediately to hug her, she took it on herself, stretching up to wrap her arms around his neck. "Don't get in any trouble while I'm gone, all right?"

"Don't worry about us," Tristan grinned, "what's the worst that could happen?"

"Don't _say_ that," Téa hissed, "now I _am_ going to worry!"

"You worry too much," He retorted, and squeezed her briefly before letting go. "you and all those old people you're going to see next week should get along _just_ fine."

She rolled her eyes and released him, and he gave the floor fan a wide berth on his way out the door to the back stairs.

A few moments after the door closed behind Duke, the lights in the upstairs studio flicked off. Tristan sat astride his bike, strapping his duffel down to the back. "I wanna talk to you," he said, not looking up, as soon as the older boy was in hearing range.

"Too bad," He could hear Duke's shrug in the dark, "I don't want to talk to you." Slim, long-fingered hands braced on the door panel and wrapped around the corner of the convertible's windshield, and Duke bounced, leaping over the side to land in the driver's seat. The shocks squeaked in protest, and the whole car leaned heavily to the left. Halogen security lamps across the alley caught the trim and threw white-hot racing stripes over the fenders.

"C'mon, please? I'm really sorry about today."

Duke wrapped his hands slowly around the polished grips of his steering wheel. He said nothing at once, focused intently on the task of fitting each finger perfectly into the molded grooves. The rings on each middle finger reflected the halogen, the same as the Cadillac. Linking the boy to the car as he moved. "I know you are," He said, with a one-shouldered shrug.

Their engines were still quiet. Téa would be looking for them, soon.

"Then why the hell are you being such a hard-ass about it?"

Duke dragged his eyes up from his study of the dashboard. They turned to study the boy on the motorcycle instead. "You wouldn't understand."

"Yes I would," Tristan retorted. The heat made both of them slow, and there were darker, sweat-stained shadows on Duke's collar that he could see from where he sat.

"All right, fair enough, you probably would. But I don't feel like telling you why." the Cadillac engine even _sounded_ heavy when it started up, and the rising roar as he touched the accelerator made discussion impossible for another thirty seconds. Was he doing it intentionally? Of course he was.

Tristan squinted against the noise, having ducked low instinctively over his motorcycle when the car at his hip suddenly sprang to life. He knew when he was being put off, and it irritated him. "That's a cop-out."

"Maybe it is. Or maybe I really _don't_ want to talk about it."

Hm. Switch to a simpler topic. "So you're not still mad about the Téa thing?"

"Why should I be upset? I know I didn't sleep with her, and I'm not spreading rumors about it—"

"Neither am I!"

"—Which makes it between you and her, then."

"You _told_ her?"

"Of course not."

"Oh. So _that's_ why she didn't want to kill me."

"Give her time," Duke's smile played at the corners of his lips, then slowly grew to take over, exposing a row of perfect white teeth. "she'll come up with another reason." Despite his earlier protest, it seemed that Duke had no immediate intentions of leaving the driveway. His convertible had an older model engine, and the hollow popping purr was soft enough to talk over.

Tristan let his bike lean a little further to the left, toward the car. "I really didn't mean to say that. It just slipped out," He added, in a lower tone.

"That's how it usually goes with you, I've noticed." Duke leaned back in his seat – the bench seats were pressed white vinyl, or was that leather? – Tristan noted, drinking in the details of the pristine car. The study eventually led him to the dark shadow of Duke's hips, and his eyes did a quick jerk up from there. Duke curled his arm over the back of the front seat, looking at him – smirking at him. Waiting for a response? He was supposed to make one now? Oh… _oh_ , right.

"I'm just trying to say I'm sorry, you prick." Tristan retorted.

"But you already said that once," Duke replied, shrugging, only one hand sliding across the polished ridges of the steering wheel now. His lips drew up into a smirk once more, "unless you're apologizing for checking me out – and if that's the case—don't."

"What?" Stare. Two. Three. _"What!"_

But Duke's right hand had already drifted down to the transmission, and jerked it cruelly into reverse as his left foot popped up on the clutch. He tore backwards, scaring Tristan enough to throw his bike hard to the right, skidded to a stop, and pealed down the alley, right arm raised high in an ironic, silent salute. It carried him to the end of the alley, ponytail flying, and then out of sight.

Tristan watched him go, and then watched the place where he'd been, a ghost reflection of green tailfins and red lights hanging in the air. He hadn't had a chance to ask what the argument was about.

Bastard.

He didn't even signal.


	5. Chapter 5

_The first thing he saw was that ponytail, and his vision drew back, panned, like a cheesy indie film shot. He could see the older boy's profile, or a little of it, outlined in moonlight that looked a lot like halogen. His arm was flung over the back of the seat of that car as they soared down a back road, headlights leaving the road and finding it again as the pavement rolled under them and dropped them down a hill with the same exhilarating sickness of a roller coaster._

_Duke's hand was on Tristan's arm with an easy, familiar intimacy. The same one he'd waved with before he disappeared around the corner. The one he used to jerk the shift. It was an old car. You had to fight with one like that. He was a lot stronger than he looked. And he could dance. The shit you never knew about some people._

_That was all it was. The headlights bobbing and the sick-sweet drop of road under them, and the warmth of the hand on his arm, just above his elbow. It was warm and…too warm and wet…_

Tristan jerked up out of sleep with his German Shepherd's tongue sloppily, frantically licking the inside of his arm. "Axl…no!" He shoved the dog's heavy muzzle away, and it came back with more force, nudging insistently. Oh. Right. It was his job to let her out into the backyard. He untangled one leg and poked it out from underneath the covers, doing the customary not-quite-awake shimmy to the edge of the bed.

Ow. Fuck. _Ow_. Moving hurt a lot more than it was supposed to, and in the wrong places. Or, more precisely, the wrong _place_. And he knew what that meant.

Axl's wet nose shoved into his hip, and he glared at her. "Will you _wait_ a minute?"

She wagged.

Slowly, cautiously, Tristan pulled himself to his knees and looked down. Yep. That was what he thought it was. _As opposed to what? You thought a pair of socks got wedged in your boxers?_ His mind sneered, _Come_ on _, Tristan, deal with it. You have a hard-on._ So…okay, that much was obvious…from the dream? No. He had to pee. That was all it was, of course. Every guy knew what that was.

But when he thought about Duke's hand on his arm, his stomach did that hill-drop, but this time there was no hill, there was no Duke, and technically it didn't even qualify as a dirty thought. _Well, shit._

When he didn't move immediately to get up, Axl tilted her nose up, mouth opening, jaws tightening with the threat of an impatient bark. Which would inevitably wake up the rest of the house.

"Okay, okay, don't! I'm getting up."

He took another minute or so to take control of the situation, and slid gingerly out of bed, drawing a sharp breath as the bare soles of his feet kissed the cold hardwood floor.

Axl hurried in front of him, and after he'd let her outside, Tristan went about the business of scrounging breakfast. The rest of the house was quiet. In the summer, he was always the first one up. This morning, however, he wished for the apnea of fall, when it was hard to part with a warm bed for the daily torture of class. He didn't want to be so awake right now, shaking raisin bran into a bowl and thinking about yesterday's discomfort and how one boy's hand on his skin could have _that_ effect on him. Correction: that hand hadn't been real.

…What if it had?

 _Shit._ Not only was his body no longer listening to him, but neither was his mind, as it furnished the image to effectively answer the question. Now _that_ qualified as a dirty thought. His attention shifted back to his bowl when the cereal box sagged in his grip. How long had he been standing here? And for all that, none of this thinking was getting him anywhere. He packed the bowl of flakes to the table. Turn, four steps forward, fridge. Milk. Was there milk? _Yup_. Was it okay? _Smells that way._ Turn, four steps back, fold out the spout, pour. At least his hands and feet were still doing what he wanted, and he still had to concentrate on what he was doing. Did it keep his mind in the present for another minute? _Yup_.

By the time he had a spoon and dug in, he was ready to deal with it. Dad always insisted that running away was not an option.

So. Work backwards, he thought, chewing over a sugar-dusted raisin and a mouthful of bland bran-flakes without tasting either.

The dream. It was the first time something like _that_ had ever managed to turn him on. Oh, and then there was Joey's ass, of course. But maybe he'd just been spacing out and his eyes just happened to land there by accident –that could happen to anybody, couldn't it? He was hot and tired then, and couldn't give a damn where his eyes went. It was possible.

But.

He hadn't been spacing out. Watching Joey dance had been a big deal, too, which he was still conscious of. Then there was Duke's hand on his bare back. _Oh god, please, somebody stop me. Stop this. I don't want to think about—_

 _Why?_ A quiet internal voice interrupted him in the middle of a full panic attack, spoon frozen halfway back down to his bowl.

Why? Because it wasn't right! It was only going to get him into more trouble, and trouble was the last thing he wanted _or_ needed.

 _They won't betray you,_ his subconscious sighed at last, _they don't even know_.

And they wouldn't, Tristan agreed adamantly, dropping his spoon in defeat. They would _never_ , ever find out. He still liked girls – Serenity was proof of that, right? Right. He rose, and turned to empty the last of his uneaten soggy cereal into the sink. Called up image after image of young women he knew, waited for a reaction. Téa was still very pretty. And hell yeah, Mai was hot.

Did he mean that? Did he really know? Or was it just something he said because he needed it, like a wall—

_Shut UP!_

Dishes crashed into the sink, louder than he'd intended, and he jumped. Tristan braced his hands on the edge of the sink; heard Axl's nails on the back door and ignored her. His eyes were wide, blind; his thoughts turned deeply inward. What _was_ all of this? And what was _he_?

* * *

_Huh. Tristan had never been in one of Joey's dreams before. At least, not by himself. Wee-eird. The guy was pacing back and forth in a room he didn't recognize. He looked nervous about something, fidgeting in an exaggerated way that let Joey know it was all fake._

 

 _Some people had a hard time with lucid dreaming, but after Malik screwed around in his head, he never had a problem controlling what he saw. Maybe it was his paranoia of_ being _held prisoner in his own brain kicking in to make sure it never happened again._

_So, since he had the upper hand here, he went and asked Tristan what the hell was wrong. The other boy never answered him, but he got worse the minute they looked at each other. He went from being edgy to being panicked, and from there went the whole nine yards to completely psycho. Joey couldn't stand by and watch the meltdown, and did the only thing he knew how. He flattened the other boy to the ground and pinned him while he thrashed. He couldn't hear anything but his own startled voice, and the image was blurry and fast, but somehow he knew when Tristan started to cry._

Joey bolted awake, and the feeling of the dream translated through the fog of half-sleep to hit him, and the tears were in his eyes before he understood. He flung an arm over his face, forearm balancing on the bridge of his nose. Outwardly, he'd never have let himself do something so weak. But right now there was a door between him and the rest of the world, and he didn't have to open it for another fifteen minutes.

He didn't take fifteen minutes to stop. One or two was enough, and then he sat up, rubbing the heels of his hands and the back of his wrist across his eyes, scrubbing away the evidence that it had ever happened. There. Time to get up now.

Everything they'd gone through two years ago scared them _all_ shitless, sure. Joey knewthat. Understatement of the freaking century, he decided, leaning over the sink to splash cold water on his face. There was no towel – they were all in the basket and that wouldn't change until hedid something about it, so he used his tee shirt instead, and went to change clothes.

He'd dealt with it pretty well, looking back. Cried a few times then, but people could overlook squeezing out a few when somebody offered to save your sister's eyesight for you. Tristan didn't have that excuse right now, and neither did he. Okay, so that was 'dream-Tristan,' and dreams didn't make much sense sometimes.

So what was Joey's excuse? For starters, he had _no_ idea what set Tristan off like that. They weren't babies, and it was waypast the age for crying because your best friend skinned his knee and _he_ was crying.

Christ. He was talking about Tristan like it'd actually happened.

And it hadn't. There was the comforting thought for the day.

So…he could have breakfast and not expect a hysterical phone call to interrupt it. Because Tristan wasn't like that, right? Right. He was tough. Really tough. Too tough to cry. Guys weren't supposed to cry.

But he'd never dreamed about Tristan before!

 _I was_ not _dreaming about Tristan, 'kay? It was just a weird dream that Tristan_ happened _to be in. Not a big deal._ "'Cause I've had freaky dreams before, and that was some grade-A freaky," Joey finished out loud with finality. He heard a break in the snores from down the hall, and bit his lip, hoping he hadn't gotten his dad up. After a minute or so, the snores picked up again and Joey breathed a sigh of relief. The guy was usually a pretty heavy sleeper, especially judging from the number of empties in the sink – give him credit for at least putting them there lately – but you never knew. He didn't feel like explaining why he was talking to himself at seven in the morning.

So it was just a dream with Tristan in it, he corrected himself with a huff of exasperation, but still – that was odd. And when they dueled, Yugi taught him to look for anything out of the ordinary – patterns in the cards his opponent played, traps and monsters set facedown. So this dream was like a facedown card? That could mean something, couldn't it? Joey went through the motions of digging out a bowl of Lucky Charms from the box that he squirreled away in the cupboard over the microwave.

No. Of course it didn't mean anything. It was just a freaking stupid _dream_.

The milk was chunky. Joey shook it, sniffed it, grimaced, and put it back on the shelf. Eh, that was okay. Milk made the marshmallows slimy, anyway. He pulled a spoon out of the dish drainer and walked across the living room to the couch under the row of windows, eating dry cereal. As he'd done for the past week, he knelt on the cushions without thinking and ate breakfast while watching the street below for Tristan's motorcycle. That way, if he came early, Joey could be downstairs quickly before the engine sounds woke up his father.

As a matter of fact, he was a little late this morning. Joey made it down to the street and was perched on the bus stop bench, tying his shoes, when the brunet boy pulled up to the curb and tossed him his helmet.

"Yo Tristan! What took ya so long?" Joey demanded as he jammed it over his head and climbed onto the bike behind Tristan. "If we're late and Duke starts in on us, I'm blamin' you!"

"Aw, what do we care if he's pissed off?" Tristan asked, shrugging, "He's not my mom."

"Damn right he's not, 'cause otherwise you'd have one ugly mom!"

Tristan straightened a little, almost bonking the back of his helmet into Joey's, and looked over his shoulder like he had something to say. He seemed to think better of it, and turned back around with a shake of his head.

Joey arched an eyebrow. "Dude, you okay?"

It just…slipped out, honest.

But he _swore_ he wasn't going to ask, and now here he was asking, and dammit if he wasn't thinking about Tristan bawling like a little kid all over again. _Well…shit_.

"Huh? Sure, I'm okay," Tristan said instantly, and gunned the engine, tearing away from the curb.

Too fast!

Joey had to grab onto him for dear life, both arms around his chest. Usually, he just hooked his fingers in the other boy's beltloops, but now that he was hanging on like this, truth be told, it felt better. Safer.

Especially if Tristan insisted on driving like a psycho.

"Geez! Don't drive it like you stole it!"

"What?" Tristan yelled over the noise, focused on the traffic. Boy, it sure was busy out here, ten minutes after eight, wasn't it? Joey inhaled exhaust fumes, choked, and clutched Tristan a little tighter, using the other boy's shoulders as a filter against the smell.

"…Never mind!"


	6. Chapter 6

The boys heard abrasive orchestra hits coming from the studio when they pulled into Téa's driveway. Duke's Cadillac was parked in its usual spot – and as Tristan walked past it, he noticed the fine sheen of dust on the otherwise spotless paint. He probably would have missed it on the mint green, but the quality of morning light here in the alley made the motes of pale dirt stand out.

Tristan heard the soft click of Joey's chinstrap. He turned around. Joey had his helmet in his hands, poised uncertainly beside the bike, looking up at the open door. Tristan followed his gaze.

Overhead, a trumpet squealed.

Joey's eyes flicked down toward Tristan. The brunet caught his movement from the corner of his eye, arched an eyebrow, and shrugged. Like _he_ was supposed to know what the hell was going on? That wasn't any music they'd practiced to before – brassy waltzes never got that out of control.

The trumpet shrilled, purling its way upward with the sheer sexiness of a red sequin skirt, and dove again, dying away.

No. Never _that_ out of control.

The pit of Tristan's stomach stirred uneasily. Intuition tapped him on the shoulder and pointed to the nearest exit. Whatever was going on in that studio, after the morning he'd had, he might not be able to deal with it. His reaction to Duke was too fresh.

While Tristan hesitated, Joey pounded his way up the steps and hurdled the fan propping the door open. Tristan threw him a beleaguered grimace, which he missed, and followed at a slower pace.

The volume of the music increased as he drew closer; new instruments came clear. First the hollow strike and hiss of drums, then piano trills rising like the trumpet and pounding alongside the percussion. Followed by thick, deep voices in a language he couldn't understand.

" _The rumba is not just a dance, all right?_

He heard Duke's voice from yesterday's uncomfortable memory, and despite his flush of embarrassment, the confusion cleared. Latin music? _Ah_. Now it made sense. The voices were Spanish.

He straddled the fan, stopped to allow his eyes to adjust to the dark of the studio. The windows across the floor were folded out, but the shades on the upper panes were lowered.

When at last he could properly see, the first thing he saw was Joey's back.

Frozen.

The blond's posture was rigid, shoulders squared, one hand braced lightly on the screen beside the door. Whatever he looked at riveted him so utterly that when Tristan stepped beside him and touched his arm, he didn't move.

Not sure what he'd see, Tristan slowly dragged his eyes away from his friend's profile to the open floor.

_Oh…_

The music died, a tiny breath taken between songs, before the sound of laughter from the disc in the machine registered the beginning of the next track. Despite his lack of expertise in the field, Tristan identified the first abrupt chords as a tango – the smooth, aggressive slide of the strings had the same effect as a stalking cat.

And there, in the middle of the room, was the cat himself, eyes squeezed tightly shut.

The morning felt jungle-humid despite the lingering cool from the night, as it had for three weeks previously. Sweat dampened the white tank top he wore. The thin, silky fabric clung to his stomach and the slender hollow of his back, translucent in spots to display a vague glimpse of skin. The leather pants were gone today, replaced by trousers in a fabric of the same color – and tight as always – but soft and matte, so that the low light didn't spangle as it would have on oilslick leather.

He was waiting. Poised attentivelyon the verge of _something_ , shifting restlessly in place as he faced the stereo, chest hitching.

Tristan couldn't control the full-body shiver as adrenaline flooded his veins. He wanted so _badly_ to bolt, but…but he couldn't. Couldn't look away, waiting tensely for the still body to catapult into movement, and praying at once that Duke would open his eyes…

…and that he _wouldn't_ see Tristan watching him. Because if he saw him…then he would stop…

Duke shifted his weight from the ball of one foot to the other, flexing his hands, closed eyes still focused on his own private world. The initial plaintive slide of the violins exploded into a burst of percussion, replaced by the digitized scream of an electric guitar.

He thrust into motion, and Tristan's stomach dropped.

An angry step forward to the left, dragging his right foot after until they met, his body arrow-straight and rigid, slender hands extended overhead. Fists clenched, arms jerked down. Stamp and spin, ponytail flaring away from his head. Push forward again. If Tristan didn't know better, he could have sworn Duke was pissed off. Frustrated to the point of screaming. His fists were tight, drawn up to shoulder level.

 _Nobody_ should be able to move their hips like that, Tristan thought. It wasn't a movement Téa taught them – nobody ever waltzed with the little extra sideways push to each step, as Duke did now. He moved like a girl, with a supple, snakelike repetition of tighten and release that fascinated with the hypnosis of a sidewinder. Like the belly dancers in exotic music videos that he and Joey watched in his basement sometimes. It wasn't _quite_ like that – and thank god that it wasn't. That would've been too weird.

But it wasn't. It _wasn't_ weird. It was just…

 _Sexy as hell,_ his body responded, and Tristan swallowed hard.

As though he knew he was being watched, Duke kept his hands above the waist, letting his audience focus completely on the sideways swing of his body into the slow rhythm. He was beginning to relax, obvious by the way the abrupt motions softened, the taut arch of his body smoothing into languid curves. Tristan changed his mind. No, he didn't move like a girl. He didn't move like anyone but himself.

Every motion lay open to scrutiny, every feeling in the movement up for interpretation by whoever watched. It felt like intruding on the older boy's privacy to an outrageous extent. That guilt was enough to – momentarily – break Tristan free of the spell.

Joey wasn't faring half so well. His eyes were wide; his jaw set. The very tendons in his neck looked taut and strained with concentration. As the brunet watched him, Joey's brows lowered, furrowed as though seeing something he didn't quite understand.

One of his best friend's powerful hands lay on the opposite arm, just above the elbow. Rubbing. Slowly. Over and over. Tristan had the strangest feeling that even Joey didn't know what he was doing.

His eyes flicked back to Duke – whose hands had meanwhile relaxed from their tight, defensive posture, and were now – _oh shit,_ Tristan's thoughts hissed in fascinated panic – running down his stomach in time to the rhythm; aggressive sweeps of sharp, curled fingertips. Hard palms forced the stretched, wet creases of fabric higher, exposing his skin. _Please don't do that_ , Tristan begged silently, praying the roaming hands didn't drift any lower,Please _don't do that…_

Joey grabbed his shoulder.

" _BWAH!_ "

"Holy _SHIT!_ "

Tristan started violently and threw Joey off with a monstrous jerk. The slighter blond boy staggered back against the divider screen. It clattered to the floor in front of the mirrors, taking Joey with it, despite his companion's valiant attempt to catch him.

Said valiant attempt pitched Tristan onto the floor a split second after Joey, and the blond grunted when his larger friend landed half on top of him.

Tristan struggled, and realized belatedly that the warm, damp softness he'd just mashed his nose into was Joey's stomach. In the back of his mind, Joey's yelp of 'holy _shit!_ ' reverberated over and over with the spastic gibbering of a chipmunk. But it wasn't Joey. It was his own common sense, crashing head-on into a roman candle display of hormonal fireworks. He couldn't seem to stop saying it. The three-beat phrase played like a waltz in reverse.

"…What the _hell_?" Duke demanded, having slid to a stop.

Add an ' _oh_ shit' to the litany.

The older boy's boots tapped on the floor as he approached them, and then the sound paused, the quiet of the studio broken a second later by breathless laughter. "Last night…" he gasped, "it was the fan…and today…it's the screen. Is this another fluke, or a new hobby?" Duke tilted his head, swallowing his snickering long enough to smirk at the blond boy in the middle of the pile. "Two on one? That screen never had a chance."

"Goddammit, get the hell off me so I can kick his ass, Tristan!" Joey bellowed, writhing underneath his friend. Against his conscience's screaming better judgment, Tristan stayed right where he was, for fear of allowing Duke's untimely death.

The tracks changed, this time to a slow ballad that seemed completely out of keeping with the situation at hand.

"Why do most of your idle threats involve my ass?" Duke asked with feigned innocence, "Preoccupied with something, are we, little Joey?"

"I got all the 'little Joey' ya want, _right here_!" Joey fired back indignantly, pointing to his nether regions and consequently Tristan, which seemed to further amuse Duke.

"I'd suggest you get up," he hiccupped at last, wiping the ball of his thumb across one eye, "because as entertaining as you are, you know we'd all _hate_ to disappoint Téa…" he leaned over to offer them a hand up.

"You mean _you_ would," Tristan retorted, hauling himself to his knees at last, embarrassed and angry at the other boy for no reason he could name, "because otherwise Téa's going to spill whatever big secret she has on you."

Duke stiffened, pulling back his fingertips before Tristan could catch them. "And if _you_ don't learn to dance, then I suppose _I'll_ have to entertain your date."

Tristan gritted his teeth under the other's superior smirk. "You're one hell of a jerk, dice boy."

"Why, thank you," came the chilly reply.

" _Nobody's_ gettin' near my sister unless he goes through _me_ first!" The exclamation came after Joey wallowed off of the screen and leaped to his feet. His fists were clenched, shoulders tight, expression unreadable beyond the obvious irritation.

"Hm, where have I heard _that_ before? Really, Joey, your comebacks would benefit from a little imagination."

"Let up, Duke," Tristan rolled his eyes, sidestepping until he was directly between the other two boys. His gaze met the older boy's, and as Duke defiantly held his eyes, the other's expression stopped Tristan cold.

Duke was _angry_?

Despite his smooth delivery, despite the laughter, once the smirk dropped, he looked like he was a short step from walking out on them completely.

What did he have to be so mad about? All they'd done was walk in on him, unannounced. For that matter, he'd gotten irritated a lot lately. Since when did Duke have p.m.s.?

Worried that his own nerves had helped bring them to this turn of events, Tristan scrambled to defuse the situation. "We didn't mean to walk in on you like that."

Oddly enough, the semi-apology seemed to disarm Duke completely. He stared at Tristan briefly, then rolled his shoulders back and slipped his hands into his pockets with a shrug. "It's okay. I wasn't doing anything important, anyway. I figured it wasn't likely _you_ two would ever be here early."

"Hey, we're only lazy when somebody asks us to do something," Joey grinned, forgetting the earlier quarrel with his usual frenetic change of mood. Duke looked as though he might comment, but then the green eyes flicked to Tristan, who raised an eyebrow. Instead, he settled for an arch smile, and turned away from them both, strolling to the stereo to turn the music off.

"Let's get to it then," he said, still with his back to his pupils as he opened the CD tray and folded the disc back into its jewel case. "And just so you know, Joey, that _wasn't_ a request."

* * *

That afternoon, Joey and Tristan fled to the basement of Tristan's house to escape the heat. As was their wont, they simply sprawled on the icy concrete floor in the dim yellow light of the single naked lightbulb overhead, letting the cold slowly seep through them and talking about nothing at all in particular. Joey had already gone through two sodas and had the third perched atop his forehead, idly trying to get it to balance.

 

"Hey Tristan?" Joey asked, after a few minutes of silence had fallen, permitting a topic-change. In the minutes previously, they'd been debating on who would win the next round of videogame snowboarding.

"Yeah?" Tristan replied, not really paying much attention to the conversation, or for that matter, anything but the cold places where his shoulders and back struck the floor.

"You saw dice boy this morning, same as me." His tone was quiet suddenly, tentative, and it only took a moment before Tristan understood what he was getting at.

"I sure did. Guy knows how to dance, that's for sure." He snorted, trying to distract the blond. "You know _we'd_ look dumb if we ever tried anything like that."

"Yeah…" Joey trailed off, turning his face away from Tristan's, reaching up to gently take the soda can from his forehead and set it aside. The aluminum can grated lightly on the floor. "I know, but…he didn't look dumb doing it."

"He doesn't look dumb doing _anything_ , Joey," Tristan obliged him, looking away and up at the ceiling instead, until only their voices met in the coolish dim.

"Ya got that right. Bastard pisses me off with how perfect he is, sometimes. Mr. Big Show."

"I don't think he does it on purpose." Despite how much the older boy annoyed him sometimes, Tristan couldn't be mad at him now. Duke hadn't done anything but expect them to show up late. _They_ were the ones barging in on him – and even though none of it made much sense to the brunet, Tristan got the feeling they'd crashed something really private.

Joey turned his head in surprise, pushing a few soaked blond straggles of hair from his eyes. "No," he sighed in defeat, "I bet you're right."

A few more moments passed in silence. "I don't get him," Joey admitted.

"Heh, me neither."

"How much did you watch?" Joey abruptly steered the conversation back on course, glancing away once more.

The abrupt change of subject required a few seconds of hard concentration before Tristan understood what he meant. "…as much as you, I guess," he lifted his hands and let them flop back.

"Tristan…" Joey rolled over then, and his eyes held a strange intensity that made the larger boy feel pinned, "…you gotta tell me something. You gotta be honest with me, or hand to god, I will beat your ass."

"Whoa, dude, calm down! Since when do I lie to you?"

Refusing to be drawn off, Joey continued. "When you were watching Duke, did you feel kinda weird?"

"Define 'weird.'" Joey was having weird feelings about Duke? Tristan couldn't sort the feelings that followed. A touch of sympathy – after all, he knew what that was like, having dealt with it only a handful of hours ago. But something like a stab of possessive jealousy insinuated itself smoothly past the barriers. His best friend was notsupposed to be having any kinds of feelings toward Duke Devlin. Because Duke was not only trying to snag Serenity, but he was alsotrying to take Serenity away from Tristan.

And now he was trying to take—

 _Shut up,_ Tristan ordered the little voice firmly, before it could do any more damage.

"I dunno…weird as in…" Joey's voice dropped, "'made ya want to touch yourself,' weird."

That was a pretty good way to define this brand of 'weird,' even Tristan had to admit.

"I'm not sure," Tristan temporized, and would wonder why, later, he hadn't demanded to know why the question had been asked. He supposed his answer wasn't exactly a lie. He wasn't sure about a lot of things. "I guess…yeah."

"Really? So I'm not—"

"Not _what_?"

"You know what the fuck I'm talkin' about, man!" Joey cried, and then there was the soft tap of the blond's hand clapping over his own mouth.

Several minutes passed, and neither spoke. The silence dropped heavily across their chests, and both boys would have given anything to reach the bulb and flick it off right now. Isolated in the dark would be a good, _good_ thing.

"So if we both…that's some twisted logic. Where did you come up with that one, genius?" Tristan's mind scrabbled for some kind of grip, taking refuge in sarcasm. Joey wasn't having any of it.

"Don't _you_ want to not be—?"

"Look, how the hell would _I_ know if you're gay? I don't _think_ you are, you've never acted like you were, and you never chased _my_ ass, so why would I think you were gay just because you stared at one guy's ass for five minutes?"

"I wasn't staring at his ass, Tristan!" Joey retorted, voice tight and desperate.

"Neither was I!" A split second after he had spoken, Tristan realized how much trouble he'd just gotten himself into. But it was too late to shut up.

"Then what the hell were you talking about?"

"I was staring at yours!"

He watched his friend's expression change with sick fascination. Joey knelt beside his hip. The warm brown eyes were hidden for a moment as his eyelashes swept slowly down, and then up once more, as though someone had switched a video to slow motion.

"You."

Hoarsely, "yeah, Joey."

"Staring at _my_ ass."

Stricken and mute, Tristan nodded. He swallowed hard and closed his eyes, not wanting to see the revulsion bound to follow. No amount of apologies could make up for this. Joey would hate him. If only he had kept the words inside. Then they could have gone on being best friends, and he would have forgotten eventually, and once this summer was past they would never talk about it…

Even had his eyes been open, he would never have seen the kiss coming.

Unexpectedly, warm, humid air touched his lips…drew away and then returned, as though in hesitation. The warm bar of Joey's forearm pressed against him as the blond propped himself up, telling Tristan instinctively that he was far too close. Before he could roll away, the heat of the mouth hanging over his dipped down, and Tristan's eyes popped open. He stared up into the blurry amber of Joey's eyes – or rather, eye, as they were so close that his features blended together.

That morning, Tristan had tried to carefully label, sort, and hide the feelings roused from last night's dream. Worried by the knowledge that he _should_ have been disturbed, he'd explained it away, various times.

The easiest excuse had been that he simply didn't _know_ how attention from Duke would make him react, having never experienced it firsthand – therefore his reaction couldn't have been caused by that.

In two seconds, his best friend silently informed him that his theory was, effectively, bullshit.

A rush of exhilaration swept through his gut from the strange, damp touch of Joey's mouth against his. A feeling of betrayal followed – Joey was ruining everything! – and in the wake of that…confusion.

If it had been anyone else, _anyone_ else…he would have punched them.

He managed to stay still, fists curled tight against his stomach, until Joey pulled back. "…Well?"

Try as he might, Tristan couldn't say a word.

* * *

"Hey…say something, asshole."

 

Joey's voice was low, tone carefully level. The light bulb above them cast his face in shadow, making it hard to read his expression. Unknown to him, it haloed the tousled strands of hair that stood out around his head, and let Tristan know that he was shaking. He hadn't realized until this moment that his arms quivered where he'd propped them, on either side of Tristan's ribs. "…Tris?"

He was begging for an answer, locked tight in fear as the minutes ticked by without a response. The brunet's eyes had slammed shut again, fists clenched, lips drawn back in a grimace as he sucked in air. Was this what he'd seen? Tristan had been afraid? _Shit, he's not gonna cry, is he?_ Joey didn't know if he could deal with that. Sure, he and the brunet had done all sorts of nasty things to one another in the course of their friendship, but never anything _that_ bad. Did this count?

Of course it counted. He'd just ruined everything. Frigging _dunce_. If he'd just paid attention to that dream, Tristan wouldn't be freaking out right now. And deep down, Joey was mighty pissed off that _this_ person, out of everyone he could possibly have kissed, was taking it this badly. Pissed off enough to haul off and slug him.

He wouldn't remember the way things happened, later, but what stood out first and foremost were Tristan's broad, callused hands. They curled slowly up his arms, as though they had minds of their own, like cats' tails. As Joey watched, determined not to chicken out and too riveted by the sensation of the other's touch to turn away, Tristan's eyes opened. Those eyes were so much like his own, if only he knew – frightened, but drawn irresistibly to that person in front of them despite their fear.

Tristan's hands continued on their path, rapidly going to Joey's shoulders, then fisting there. And with that, the debate was over. He sat up and Joey helped him in the scramble to close the distance between them.

The blond's fingertips snatched handfuls of the back of his best friend's shirt. It was cold and clammy from the basement floor, and his palms were the same, but Tristan's touch on the back of his neck was almost feverishly warm.

The second kiss was hardly graceful, as both partners tried to lead the dance and failed miserably. By then they were so caught up in the seriousness of the moment that the fumbling hardly mattered. At last, Joey turned his head just the right way, and it seemed like they found _the_ spot, where everything fit. From the sound Tristan made just then and the tightening of fingers on the back of his neck, he assumed he wasn't the only one feeling that way. There was a kind of victory in that – he could almost feel Tristan going weak in his arms now and weak wasn't a side of the brunet that he saw very often.

Tristan's hands tangled up in his hair, and he moaned— _nothing_ had ever felt so good. Not stopping to check in with his conscience, Joey shoved his partner roughly back to the floor.

"Easy on the goods," Tristan muttered, smiling against Joey's lips. The blond boy snickered uneasily.

"Tch. I'll beat your ass if I want to," Joey retorted.

"You _wish_."


	7. Chapter 7

"It's about time. You're late, Duke Devlin."

A rush of frigid air lifted the hair away from Duke's face as Mai opened her apartment door. Her parents had an excessive amount of funds, but despite the comforts the immense Valentine estate offered, their daughter insisted on living apart from them. She had since she was eighteen. Though lessons in deportment came with finishing school, she behaved in stubborn contrast to her upbringing – from eating fast food to slouching when she watched television. She lived on her own income and was quite proud of the fact. Her independence one of the many reasons Duke admired her.

"Your air conditioner's working," he observed.

"You're wasting it." she snatched his wrist and dragged him inside.

"You called a half hour ago, saying that you needed _desperately_ to talk to someone," Mai pushed the door shut, rounding on her guest. She gestured dramatically for emphasis.

Duke's eyes narrowed, feeling mocked. "I wasn't that bad. And if I remember, you _ordered_ me to call you whenever I need to talk."

"That's because I'm secretly hoping I'll turn you straight one of these days, hon," Mai pulled the long, wavy cascade of blonde hair away from the back of her neck with both hands and tossed him a careless smirk. "All that lust is wasted on those boys, I'm sure you know."

"Not going to happen anytime soon," Duke smirked, "but for the record, if I had the choice, you'd be at the top of my list."

"Liar."

The young woman eased past him one hip at a time, and led him to the small kitchen where she entertained the majority of her guests. Duke pulled a stool up to the island that sectioned the dining area from the rest of the kitchen. He folded his arms on the edge, watching her fill a glass at the tap. The radio on the windowsill above the sink blared, filling the kitchen with music. Mai reached out and flicked the volume dial, and the trumpet squeals muted down to a pleasant buzz.

"All right, so you'd make top ten, at the very least," the younger man corrected himself

"You rate people like a Billboard chart? I'm flattered." Mai pushed the glass across the counter to him, and circled the island, hopping up to sit on the cool granite surface beside him. "Is this an annual thing that you do, or more of a week-by-week…?"

"Day-by-day, actually. What can I say? I'm fickle." Duke took a pull at his drink. "Seriously though, I'd take you over these idiots if I had the opportunity." He turned away toward the window, unconsciously twining a few strands of hair around his fingertip. "Whoever said that girls were more complicated than guys was full of shit."

"'These'? Plural? Mm, have your eye on a harem, I see," Mai observed cheerfully. Duke shot her an irritated glare, and she winked. "Oh, don't take things so seriously. You know I love you, but you can be a bit of a drama queen."

"Only for a good cause."

"Mm-hm," Mai tipped her head to the side, lips pursed in thought, "and does this 'good cause' happen to have huge hands, weird hair, and a wardrobe better suited to a Sturgis rally?"

"He's not _that_ bad, Mai."

"When did I say that leather motorcycle jackets were a bad thing?" The blonde woman's deep purple eyes widened playfully. "You're defending him. How cute."

"Téa thought it was _real_ cute," Duke said, slumping over the counter, fingernails scritching against the chrysanthemums etched on his water glass. Eyes carefully lowered, he could see the shocked expression pointed at him now from his periphery, but he refused to look up.

"You told _Téa_?" Mai demanded, in a tone that implied 'are you really that _dumb_?' When he didn't answer her immediately, perfectly manicured fingertips clamped his chin in a vice grip and forced his head up. "I like the girl, but she's friends with everybody but the Dali Lama – what if she told the boys that you—?"

A pair of serious green eyes gazed soberly back at her. Mai let go of his chin abruptly. "You were grumbling about teaching the boys to dance. You said you _had_ to, even though you didn't want to. Let me guess. She's dangling this thing over your head like a carrot."

"A really embarrassing carrot," Duke replied, and returned to studying his water glass.

"That little—!" Mai almost sounded admiring.

"—She wouldn't really tell them," Duke cut in quickly. He sounded as though he was reassuring himself. Mai pursed her lips.

"…I don't think," he finished, weakly.

"That doesn't make any sense," Blonde ringlets rustled as Mai shook her head. She folded her legs beneath her on the countertop. "You're right. She _wouldn't_ do something like that to you – you two are as close as they come without sleeping together." At Duke's pained look, one elegant eyebrow rose. "What?"

"Nothing," Duke replied, waving for her to continue, and propped his cheek moodily in his opposite hand.

"You didn't, did you?"

"Does _everyone_ think I slept with Téa?"

Wisely, Mai didn't answer. "So. She wouldn't threaten something that could _really_ hurt you _and_ her friends. So maybe she knows something you don't."

"Like what? Tristan's secretly gay?" Duke rolled his eyes. "Sure Mai. Whatever you say. He's so straitlaced that it hurts. I can't even mention Serenity without getting the Look."

"What look?"

"The look that says 'private property, back the fuck off.'"

"Language," Mai warned, smiling when the pair of green eyes narrowed, "no, I'm not picking on you. But if you lose your temper, I'm throwing you out. It's unproductive and the stress is bad for my skin."

Despite himself, the older woman's answer surprised a snicker out of Duke. Silence spread between them for a while, then, as Duke nursed sips of his water and alternately listened to the quiet hum of the radio and looked out the window. He was waiting for her to go on – he knew she had something else to say by the tension in her posture.

It looked like it was boiling outside. The street wouldn't start to cool down until six or so, which meant another three hours of sweltering heat. Even now – the building across the street looked dusty-dry, too brightly lit in the afternoon sun. Its shadow and the shadows of the other buildings fell in hard edges. Mai had a second-floor apartment, so he couldn't see the street from here, but he already knew it in his mind. He wasn't looking forward to going out there again.

"Téa knows Tristan and Joey better than anybody," Mai went on, as he'd expected, interrupting his train of thought, "except for maybe Yugi. Seriously, Duke. Whether they've told her anything or not, she might have picked up on something you wouldn't notice."

"For example…?" Duke's brows rose, one corner of his mouth twisted up in a skeptical quirk.

"For example…are you _sure_ Tristan's look means he's possessive of Serenity? And when Joey's threatening to hurt you if you touch his sister…"

"Now that's _really_ reaching, Mai," Duke interrupted, and drained his glass. "So we assume that every guy who threatens me secretly wants to get in my pants? In that case, half of the male student body wants me." Smirk. "Who knows? You might be right."

"Don't kid yourself," Mai retorted, stifling a snicker, "Want a refill?"

"Sure." He picked up the glass and handed it to her, and she hopped off of the counter.

"You know," Mai said thoughtfully over the rising hiss of the tap, "I don't ever remember Joey saying he never _liked_ you. Just that he knew what you were up to." She handed the glass back across the counter, full once more, and leaned on the island opposite Duke.

"You're taking this awfully well," Duke mused, accepting the drink. Mai shrugged.

"If there's one thing you need to learn about Joey Wheeler, it's that he'll make his own decision in the end, no matter what you tell him. Besides. He's a little young for me." She winked. " _You_ , on the other hand…"

"But we're only a year apart, Mai!" Duke protested with a smile, "I think you just like chasing the unattainable."

"It's a temptation I can't resist," The blonde chuckled, folding her forearms under her breasts as she leaned on the counter. "But unless I'm off, I think it's a temptation of yours, too."

"Can I ask why you agreed to help me in the first place?" Duke blurted, ignoring the earlier jab.

"You said you were keeping your options open," Mai shrugged once again, tilting her head to the side, "Joey and Tristan are both nice boys, they're friends of mine, and I want you to be happy."

"You sound like my mom." Duke gave her a sideways look.

"Somebody has to," Mai smiled, and reached out to pat his cheek, "I can spank you too, if you ever need it."

Duke ducked away from her hand with a snort. "I think I'll pass."

"Any idea of what you'll do if they _both_ turn out to like guys? You'll have your hands full, then. If they get into trouble because of you, I _will_ spank you."

"Killjoy. Maybe it's time those two goofs finally had something to _really_ fight about." Duke's smirk widened, earning himself a deadly glare. He threw up both hands in defense. "I'm _kidding_! I don't think it'll ever happen – but the last thing I want is for them to murder each other."

He sounded like he meant it. Mai reached over and flicked one of the long, kinky chunks of hair that tumbled over his diamond-checked headband. "Maybe you should just have both," she grinned, "Then they _can't_ fight over you."

Duke looked at Mai for a long moment, as though he might take her seriously, before they both dissolved into snickers.


	8. Chapter 8

Duke's hours at the game store started at five and went to ten – the staff handled the daytime hours except during the Christmas rush and so forth – and the shop closed at six on weekdays. Part of his duties included restocking shelves and minding the inventory. As the former required very little concentration, Duke found his mind wandering as he stacked boxes in the colorful cardboard displays.

 

The window display from Dungeons and Dragons was delivered today. He had assembled the large cardboard Silver Dragon already tonight, because god knew the daytime staffers couldn't be trusted with anything that required written instructions. There were already eyehooks in the ceiling above the window – he had only to rummage up some string to run through the grommets in the dragon's back. Which he did as soon as the last puzzles went from their packing box into the appropriate bin.

It was menial work, Duke thought, stretching to pluck a spool of white cotton twine from a top shelf in the back room, but he really liked doing it. Previously, he had taken the first shift of normal store hours, and quickly found out that he simply didn't have the patience for dealing with customers. It required too much personal attention. He wasn't known for his patience anyway, and with the exception of Yugi and his strangely accepting band of companions, Duke expected that he didn't have many friends for the same reason.

He was well aware of how abrasive he came off. The greater part of his behavior was intentional – a conditioned response to keep the masses at a distance. He and his father moved often; Domino was the first place they'd spent more than a year in. He wasn't sure what to do about forming attachments, having tried his best not to make them everywhere else that he lived.

Now, it seemed, the attachments were making themselves. In a little over a year and a half, he'd found a circle of friends, graduated from a high school with kids he knew, and in the fall would be starting at Domino University. He planned to major in business management, with an eye to eventually buying the game store from his father. His future was here. His friends were here.

He liked it here.

Royalties came from Dungeon Dice Monsters, which helped widen the profit margin for his store – and Industrial Illusions offered a position as a design consultant when he finished college.

Life seemed – all in all – neat, precise, and laid out for him in a very logical order.

Duke narrowed his eyes as he double-knotted the cut end of the length of string – he couldn't _possibly_ be completely happy with that. Could he?

The dragon's harness completed, Duke hefted it, watching the jointed wings bob slowly, a few inches from the floor.

Admittedly, after accompanying Yugi on his adventures, he'd become something of an adrenaline junkie. But that was all past. Pegasus insisted he prepare for college, and he hadn't traveled to the game mogul's San Francisco-based compound since the summer previously. He had the money to leave if he wanted, but responsibility stopped him.

Responsibility. At seventeen, he'd been to every major country in the world. By almost nineteen, he was pinned in Domino City, a town waiting to be swallowed in the urban sprawl of the west coast.

The most disturbing thing about all of this was the niggling itch to run that had always followed him in the past. The annoying little pressure in the back of his mind that he _expected_ to have…and didn't.

Lifted a little higher and twitched, the dragon's wings beat a lumbering rhythm, body flipping abruptly up and down in a kind of slow-motion panic. He put it down and went to the broom closet for the stepladder to hang it up.

Was he growing up? But that was bullshit. Last year his plan had been to summer in Greece before finding a college abroad. Twelve months of getting older didn't change things _that_ much.

Twelve months ago was the summer that Téa's former dance partner moved away. Duke's daytime manager became suddenly very ill at about the same time, and with no time to hire and train a substitute while she was hospitalized, he alternated shifts with a senior clerk.

There went the summer vacation. A month later, his manager was back and he was at loose ends.

An unexpected visit from Téa changed his plans. The tall brunette dancer asked him for a favor, bribed him with a meal out, and propositioned him to let her tutor him for an amateur dance competition in the fall. Their entry fees were already paid, and if she didn't work with _someone_ , she'd fall out of practice.

Not having anything else to do, he agreed.

Maybe that was when things started to change, Duke thought. It seemed like the more time he spent with Téa, the less annoying she became.

Of course, she could _still_ be annoying.

Maybe he'd just learned to let it go, because deep down, Téa was actually a pretty good person to have around. And could she _ever_ dance. Before her influence, Duke never paid much attention to music, as he lacked the time to stop and appreciate it. Now, he found himself addicted to it.

Addicted to this place, and these people.

The store was too quiet for him. His father usually spent most of the night in the basement of the building – distant tappings and hammerings and the occasional flicker of the lights indicated that he was still alive – no doubt working on another project. Duke stepped down from the ladder and dusted off his hands as he inspected his handiwork. The dragon turned lazily in the still air, soaring over the board games, figurines, adventure booklets and piles of six-sided dice he'd previously arranged in the storefront window. It looked good.

A quick check of the clock over the counter indicated that it was just past ten. Duke hurried to flick on the security lights and catapulted upstairs to change into jeans and a tank top, and from there out the back entrance, making a beeline for his convertible. He had two hours before his own self-imposed curfew. Two and a half if he felt like it.

Enough time to get out past mass suburbia and into the hills. There was one gravel road in the area that he knew about.

Not breaking stride as he jammed the door closed behind him, Duke bolted across the rear lot and launched himself over the hood of his car, sliding across the paint on his hip from fender to fender with a Cheshire-cat grin. He _loved_ doing that.

The night was wet-hot, but it seemed like sacrilege to put the top up and use the air conditioner. Accustomed to the cool indoors, his skin shone with a thin allover layer of sweat almost as soon as the evening air contacted it. In a few minutes, he tore out of the alley, and flipped on the stereo after he'd turned the corner.

Predictably, the local oldies station was playing John Mellencamp again. Groaning, Duke reached out to change the channel – but the radio had the traditional twist-knob tuner instead of the modern push buttons, and it seemed like too much work in this heat to find a different station. Ah, hell, let it ride.

Instead of the usual ditty about growing up in a small town – which never failed to make Duke roll his eyes – this particular song was one from the early eighties, throaty vocals begging between repetitive guitar riffs to 'make it hurt so good.'

He knew it was different the minute the lead guitar picked up from the bass, with the kind of energetic major chords he was used to hearing over the baseball field loudspeakers. This wasn't the same tired old stuff – and nodding a little bit into the heavy, rapid-fire percussion, he pressed the accelerator and let it carry him out of town.

Not so unexpectedly, the song made him think about Tristan. The other boy might be almost a year younger than he was, but he was broader through the shoulders, taller, and had an ass that begged for high-intensity staring. Especially when he insisted on wearing the blue jeans that hugged his hips.

And he did that a lot.

Duke's fingertips squeezed on the vinyl bulb of the stick-shift, and when the engine wound up, he pressed the clutch and shifted up.

Tristan had a hard feel to him. Like the way the car jerked back when he popped the clutch out again. Like the way the percussion hammered up in the music before the chorus. It hurt his ears in a good way, and he dialed the volume up another few notches.

Tristan was another reason why he wanted to stay in town. Maybe he didn't know it – hell, Duke was pretty sure he didn't – but over those same twelve months he'd been learning to dance, he'd gone a little crazy for the guy. Téa pushed him to join her group of friends once more, and like the dancer with the round blue eyes and the swishy bob of brown hair, the rest of the slightly goofy troop grew on him all over again.

Joey and Tristan grew on him most of all. He'd always found the pair of them attractive – how could he _not_? – but over the previous seasons, from summer to summer again, he'd seen sides of both that never came through during their adventures.

They were both scarily good at Blackjack and Spades, for instance – from years of illicit card games in study hall. Joey could do fantastic vocal impressions – he especially liked to mimic Marik's evil side, and the amount of obscene and hysterical things that "Evil Marik" said when Joey held the reins boiled the uncomfortable memories down to a simple matter of laughter.

Tristan's favorite color was orange. Joey had a comic book hero. The brunet was teaching the blond how to use an airbrush. The former liked classic rock, which the latter teased him about – but he owned a _Van Halen_ album, too.

Little things.

There was a weird sense of satisfaction in knowing the details. And a weird hurt, too. They probably didn't know a thing more about him than they ever did. In hindsight, he knew that was his own fault, and it irritated him.

But that was the intention of his original plan, wasn't it? To get past the male bonding rituals where his relationships with the boys always stalled. To show either one of them – _or both, you know you want to show them both,_ his selfish inner voice whispered – that he was more than…whatever they thought he was. That he was alive, too.

The song died down, and after a brief pause for the radio station's call ditty, Sammy Hagar's electric guitar cut into the silence like a searchlight. Smirking to himself, Duke stamped the accelerator. The Cadillac engine roared open, demanding another shift up as the underlying hum wound up tight again. His headlights scissored into the dark. Except for the clear night sky and the occasional passing car, he was alone. Another ten miles and he'd hit the back hills, and then he'd have to slow down. Right now he was running on a straightaway parallel to the gentle rise in the landscape.

And then, just as suddenly…he wasn't alone.

A single headlight bounced up over the incline behind him. Its aura shone over the rise first before bright halogen flashed in his rearview mirror. He didn't have long to wait before he registered that it was a motorcycle, gaining fast.

On the radio, Sammy Hagar screamed.

Duke's smirk widened. What? He thought he could pass? _Let him try._ He waited until the other driver was almost on his bumper, and then accelerated. Somewhere between the shrieking stereo and the whine of his tires on the road, Duke caught the sound of the motorcycle opening up. It was on his tail again in a minute or two, and the ten-mile marker was hurtling up fast.

Cadillacs were not made for cornering. He had to slow down as the first curve came in sight, and despite his frantic hand-over-hand, the huge rear end of the car fishtailed. The whole works drifted hard to the guardrail. Duke gritted his teeth, tendons in his neck straining against the force of the turn.

 _Please not the paint,_ shit _not the paint…_

By some miracle, he didn't clip the corrugated steel, and saw over his shoulder as he straightened the wheel that the driver behind him had nearly laid his bike down sideways in the turn.

Adrenaline bubbled in his blood from the near-miss. Eager for more, he pushed the Cadillac around the next curve. The pale ridged nose bucked up as they started on the incline into the back country road. A few more minutes, and they'd hit gravel. His expression smoothed into a mask. He glanced up into the mirror.

The motorcycle was still behind him.

As it drew closer, he got a glimpse of the motorcycle beyond the retina-blistering headlight, and saw that the gas tank and the front fender were white. The machine shifted to the left, and gleamed wetly pink in the proximity of Duke's taillights.

"SHIT!" Duke yelped reflexively, resisting the impulse to turn and see if it was who he thought it was. The next corner was a blind one, and he had to brake again. A hill rose to their right, butted up against the road, blocking the view of oncoming traffic. Good. He could slow down without worrying about being passed; avoid kissing the rail on the _other_ side of the pavement. Wind tugged at his ponytail, and inertia pressed the armrest into his side, while his stomach muscles fought to counteract it.

He was wrong about the bike.

When his speedometer dropped below forty, the motorcycle leaned sideways and blew around him, blind curve or no blind curve.

First awed by the gutsy move, then pissed off, Duke's first instinct was to accelerate – chase that red taillight taunting him from the oncoming lane – pass him again before he could get over.

White light flared on the visor of the driver's helmet.

Oncoming car!

Swearing, Duke slammed on the brakes. The tires squealed in protest as the Cadillac slid sideways.

His rear tire struck the shoulder. Pea gravel shot up into the wheel well and sprayed wildly away from the spinning treads.

The motorcycle whipped to the right inches ahead of Duke's bumper.

A pickup truck flew around the corner in the left lane, going the other direction.

The gust of wind blew his ponytail across his right shoulder. He slouched down in his seat, eyes clamped shut, teeth gritted against the sound of a sickening crunch that never came. He couldn't see anything but the bright light against his eyelids.

He opened his eyes. Not far ahead of him, the bike was parked. The driver looked back at him, anonymous in a black helmet and denim jacket. After a few minutes of staring blankly at each other, he waved for Duke to follow him.

There was a turnout not far beyond the corner, and stunned mute, Duke followed the motorcycle at a far more sedate pace to the little rest stop. Only competing with itself now, the radio was painfully loud. Duke leaned over, switching it off.

He noted with a detached horror that his hand shook.

They rolled together off the main road, tires crunching on more pea gravel, and Duke turned off the ignition. The engine rumbled into silence, followed by soft metallic tinging and popping as it slowly cooled. Only the crickets and the distant hum of the highway filled the dark void of quiet here. Fireflies hung in the air, winking on and off between the trees.

"…Holy shit…" Duke groaned, slouching down in his seat. He covered his eyes and fought off the wave of euphoria and nausea that followed.

"What the hell were you _doing_?" A tight, angry voice demanded. Not opening his eyes, Duke heard the hollow click and slide of a helmet being ripped off. Heavy footsteps rapidly approached the side of his car.

"What the hell was _I_ doing?" Duke retorted, "What the _fuck_ were _you_ doing? That was the most—" Pause. The voice was familiar; had caused an immediate, reflexive reaction. He looked up. "It _was_ you!"

Tristan looked down at him. Even in the dark, his glare was obvious. "Damn straight it was me."

"I didn't see _you_ slowing down," Duke pointed out.

"I was _trying_ to catch you!" Tristan retorted. His voice still sounded very strange. Not only angry now but…scared?

"And so it's _my_ fault that you decided to pass me on a blind curve?"

Tristan didn't answer.

"Well?" Duke persisted.

"I don't know why I did that!"

Something in Tristan's tone warned him not to push any further. Under normal circumstances, that would have been like waving a red flag in front of a bull. Given the events of the past few minutes, Duke figured it was poor sportsmanship to press his luck.

"That doesn't surprise me," he snorted, and sat up, reaching over the sill of the door to shove Tristan back with one hand.

"What does _that_ mean?"

"Nothing," Duke grunted as he launched himself over the door, "just an observation." He leaned against the front fender, crossing his arms. Now that the adrenaline dissolved, his hands were still shaking and he felt tired; overtaxed and weak.

He tried not to think about the difference a few seconds made.

"I thought you weren't coming out of that first corner!" Tristan accused after a few moments of heavy, irritated silence, "You scared the shit out of me!"

"I've had my license since I was sixteen, thanks," Duke reported, sarcasm dropping with an almost audible thud.

"I saw you shoot out of the intersection on Sixth Street," Tristan was going on, as though the details made all the difference, "I figured you were headed for the mill. So I followed you. Like I'm supposed to know you're some kind of stunt driver?"

"How'd you know I was headed for the mill?"

"I grew up here," Tristan glared, aggravated that Duke persistently switched subjects, "it's about two miles down the only gravel road in the county." He shrugged. "Lucky guess."

"But—"

"You had gravel dust on your car last night."

Duke slid away from him, fingertips dragging lightly on the fender toward the nose of his car as he stepped backward. "What are you, some kind of stalker?"

Tristan looked puzzled by the question. "Stalker?"

"The gravel dust, and the road, and the—like a wannabe PI." The corner of his mouth twisted upward. "So was this your 'chase scene'? Tracked the perp down, and—"

"I'm just good at putting two and two together, dude, that's all." Tristan watched him, but apparently realized that he was nervous, and kept his distance. "Especially when you tore out of Domino, hell-for-leather."

"Like you're one to talk."

"I _told_ you why I came out here." The brunet's large hands spread wide, held palms-up before Duke in a plea for mercy. "Will you just stop?"

"Hey, I'm not the one who ran me down, now, am I? And _I'm_ not the one who almost—" Duke bit the sentence off sharply as Tristan nearly shoved him to the ground.

He stumbled, dimly realizing through the sudden sharp upswing of adrenaline that he hadn't been pushed – just clipped on the way past. He staggered back against the bumper, fingertips snatching at the raised edge of the left hood pin for balance.

By the time he found his feet, the other boy was nearly to his motorcycle, just reaching down for the helmet that had fallen into the grass. Tristan paused as he straightened, wiping the bottom of his tee shirt across the plastic outer shell.

"Where do you think _you're_ going?" Duke demanded, stalking after him.

"Home," Tristan replied tersely, not turning back as he finished toweling the dew from the helmet and jammed it on his head.

Duke grabbed his elbow. "Not yet, you're not."

His quarry wheeled on him at the touch. Duke stared defiantly up into Tristan's eyes, and suddenly entertained the image that he'd snatched a tiger by the tail. A very _irritated_ tiger, who wanted very much just to be left alone, thank-you-kindly.

He jerked his hand away, still unable to turn his gaze from Tristan's. Something was off here – he sensed it on an instinctive level. The other's behavior was 'wrong' in all sorts of tiny ways. Tristan was tense. Heh. Understatement of the night. Grabbing him just now felt like waving a lighter under the fuse of a firecracker.

He backed off. Lowered his eyes at last. Flicked the lid of that particular lighter closed. "…Sorry."

It was very quiet now. The Cadillac's engine had cooled completely and was silent, leaving them insulated in a smothering blanket of dripping humid dark. Tristan hadn't moved from the spot. Then came the thick hiss of his denim jacket slipping off, followed by the slap of it as he turned and slung it over the back of his bike. "Still going to the mill?"

Duke's shrug was lost in the dark. "That was the plan."

"I'll meet you there."

Tristan threw his leg over the back of his bike, and fired it up, washing Duke in the crimson of his taillight as the older boy stepped back. He stood in the beam, watching Tristan pull up onto the road and disappear up the hill.

He walked back to his car, dragging his fingers indecisively on the fender, and looked up again to the road.

There was something Tristan wasn't telling him – this wasn't the same person from yesterday, or the day before. Why else would he be out on his bike after ten? Why would he have pulled a deadly stunt like passing on a blind curve – and then been unable to explain why he did it? If it was a simple explanation, he'd simply have passed it off with a smirk.

That thought alone made the hair lift on the back of his neck. Tristan…didn't _want_ to get hit…did he?

No. Duke held the opinion that the taller, darker boy felt things a bit more keenly than most people assumed, but the possibility of suicide – no matter _how_ angry Tristan was – refused to fit into the picture. He had too much common sense to try something like that.

Something simply shook him up to the point that he couldn't think. Or wouldn't. Whatever it was, Duke decided, hauling himself into the driver's seat, he was going to find out.

* * *

The high beams of the Cadillac bounced up over the last rise in the road, and slid smoothly down the opposite side to the spit of land overlooking a water valley trapped between the hills here. The mill had been built here to harvest local lumber – it was a central location between two towns, and the deep, narrow river that funneled into the pond provided a perfect highway to ship raw lumber from both banks to the saws.

 

It was long defunct, the building no longer sound. These woods were protected now, but the mill pond still made an excellent retreat in the summer.

Duke pulled off of the gravel and onto the grass, to a spot rubbed bare by many tires. His headlights bounced off of the pale body of Tristan's bike, leaving it glowing for an instant when he turned off the engine and the white halogen died away.

Tristan wasn't there.

A splash echoed off of the hillside. Free of the trees here, the moon illuminated the greater part of the pond. Perched on the worn rounds of stone pushing up from the shore was Tristan, tossing chunks of shale into the water.

Right. This was behavior so far removed from the norm that Duke was starting to wonder if his friend hadn't been kidnapped by aliens. Or brainwashed. He picked his way carefully down the rocks to sit by Tristan's side on another upended rock. The depression fit his backside perfectly, and he crossed his legs, pulling his boots off to toss back up onto the grass.

Time to take the bull by the horns, Or the tiger by the ears, if you will. "What's with you?"

"Nothing."

"Bullshit. _Look_ at me. I almost watched you made into roadkill a few minutes ago. And _I'm_ not acting like I'm going to implode." Duke rocked back onto his hands. "Something's eating you."

"It's been a bad day."

"You're telling _me_."

Tristan looked up at the exasperation in Duke's voice, and frowned. "What happened?" He closed his eyes when the ponytailed boy's expression flashed him a silent 'well, _duh_.' He took a deep breath, and rephrased. "Besides the obvious."

"Well…first two losers crashed in on me at eight in the morning. _And_ knocked some of the hinges loose in Téa's screen, so I've got to fix those."

"I can fix that…" Tristan sounded chagrined, and rightly so.

"Don't bother," Duke said flatly. "After that, I wasted a whole afternoon on a project that doesn't have a chance in hell of working. It's hot. I spent two hours putting together a freaking cardboard _dragon_."

Tristan squeezed his eyes in confusion. "The dragon took you a whole afternoon?"

"I wasn't talking about the dragon," Duke snapped.

"But I thought you said…" At the other's strangled moan, Tristan fell silent.

"…And now tonight, I've been chased down by a stalker…" Duke hurried on, ignoring the brunet's sputtering, "…and nearly watched my best friend bite it. Said best friend continues to stonewall. Now it's _your_ turn." He shut his mouth with a snap and stared at Tristan, as though that could compel him to speak.

There was no answer, as Tristan turned moodily back to the water. Duke moaned again, breaking the silence with a guttural howl of frustration. He got to his feet and leapt for Tristan, bare feet skittering dangerously across the rocks. "That's it. You're dead set on playing this game? You can do it down there."

"What the— _ACK!_ " Tristan cried out as a mighty shove pushed him off of his perch and – too far gone to catch hold of the ledge or right himself – he plunged into the water.

The water here only came up to the hips, but he made an impressive splash going in. He came up spluttering, slipping on the pebbly bottom as he tried to regain his balance. Oh…that was _it_. Duke's ass was _so_ hamburger.

He stared up at the bank, eyes hazed with red.

…Where'd he go?

In his thrashing, he'd missed the second splash until it was too late.

Cold, slender hands wrapped around his ankles and yanked him off of his feet.

Desperately, he tried to kick away as his head went under, but the hands were moving up his legs, over soaked jeans to his hips, and then to his waist, holding him firmly down from behind for a moment before climbing over him completely and stroking away.

When he surfaced again, Duke's head was bobbing a few feet away from him, hair plastered to his head. He was smirking. Tristan made a grab for him, diving under the surface after him when his prey vanished.

They tussled, chasing through the teeth-chattering cold water, wrestling and skimming waves at one another until furious spluttering turned to snickering. Exhausted at last from fighting in waterlogged jeans, Duke stayed still long enough for Tristan to pin him against one of the smooth stone outcroppings.

Trapped by the arms braced on either side of the rock, he held up his hands. "Okay. _Okay!_ So you win…you don't have to talk if you don't want to…I'm too tired to fight with you." He closed his eyes, surprised at how cold the air seemed now that he'd grown accustomed to the water. "I just didn't want you to explode." He was dripping wet. He'd better have a towel in the trunk, or the vinyl was going to be—

His thoughts cut off abruptly as wet fingertips stroked down the side of his face, pushing away the sodden hair plastered to his cheek. A shiver worked its way down his spine, and despite the cold, he felt his skin burn against the chilly water.

…It was too ridiculous for words. Too outrageous to hope for.

Too tempting to let his hands slip out of the water and smooth up Tristan's sides.

The brunet's tee shirt was soaked through, and hid nothing from his touch.

He seemed to be having some trouble breathing.

Duke's fingertips outlined the narrow waist…the layer of muscle that sheathed his ribs and led him to a powerful chest. The hand that had only just touched Duke's face was cupping the side of his neck now. The further northward he ventured, the more those tense fingers twitched.

Unable to resist, Duke leaned forward. As he did so, he felt the other's body go rigid under his palms. His eyes opened and flicked up. The moonlight threw spangles up from the water onto both of them, veining their skins subtly with lines of silver. The bright reflection couldn't hide Tristan's gaze.

The dark eyes held the strangest expression he'd ever seen – his pupils were wide; features holding a mix of intense concentration…and worry.

When Tristan started to lean away from him, Duke lowered his hands and straightened; pushed instead at the arm still restraining him from reaching the bank. "Can I go now?"

Without a word, the barrier was dropped, and he waded unsteadily to the lowest part of the bank. When climbing out proved difficult, an unexpected pair of hands boosted him onto the rocks.

Well…take what you can get. "All of this was just an elaborate setup so you could grab my ass, wasn't it?" He grinned over his shoulder, and turned to offer Tristan a hand up.

The hesitation in the other boy's touch hurt, but at least Tristan hadn't refused his help altogether.

"I didn't mean to—" Tristan started, but Duke had already turned away, picking his way back to his boots, and then up the bank to his car.

He looked down at himself, and then back at Duke. His arms flopped helplessly at his sides, water dripping down his fingertips and staining the rocks below.

The other's engine roared as the Cadillac pulled back, turned around and headed in the direction they'd come, leaving Tristan in a wash of red light, slowly receding.


	9. Chapter 9

Tristan's house was dark when he walked his motorcycle up the driveway. He'd popped the transmission into neutral and killed the engine at the end of the street, and prayed that someone had forgotten to close the garage door. It yawned open in front of him, dark and silent. So far, so good.

The screen door between the garage and the kitchen was unlatched, and he pressed his fingertips to the wood gingerly, betting against the telltale squeak that would give him away. Next was the dining room, and Tristan kept to the wall to avoid the creaks in the floor, and from there…the stairs. He hoped that Axl was asleep in his room. Hoped that nobody _else_ was waiting for him in his room.

He was wet and running on auto-pilot, and didn't feel like explaining his current situation to anyone but a pillow.

As he passed the living room, he caught a glimpse of a pale face on the couch in the dim light, and froze.

A longer look, and Tristan identified the swelled curve of stomach, hidden underneath a thin layer of white sheet. He let his breath out slowly as a hazy memory stirred. Yes. His older sister Erin. Her husband was away on a business trip. She was pregnant again, and her due date was in two weeks. She was staying with them. Relief. He remembered now.

She was asleep on the fold-out mattress. Her first son, two-year-old Georgie was next to her, also asleep. He'd kicked free of the sheets and curled into a tight ball on his side. Dark curls of brown hair were matted to his head with sweat from the stifling summer heat.

Tristan started moving again, up the stairs and down the hall. Soft, regular snores issued from his parents' bedroom.

No thinking allowed until he'd gotten safely into his room and closed the door.

At last, the sodden clothes came off, slapped carelessly into the basket beside his desk. He was used to navigating his room in the dark. Dim orange light filtered through the slats of his window fan, leaving patterns in the soft shadows on the wall. He touched things lightly as he passed, only brushing with the tips of his fingers to avoid upsetting a book or a noisy sheaf of papers onto the floor. Axl was asleep in his room, stretched across the foot of his bed – a pale lump in the dark.

Stripping down was a tedious business in the humid, dead air. His skin was still wet, and dried slowly as he rifled naked through his underwear drawer. There. Tristan pulled on a pair of loose cotton shorts. Couldn't tell what color they were, but they would do.

He reached out and flipped on his window fan, shivering as a blast of air struck his chest. It felt good. He closed his eyes.

…This was officially the day from hell.

His palms tapped lightly against the raised window sash as he stood in front of the fan, and let the past few hours replay in his mind.

Chasing down Duke's car was unplanned. That evening, after he'd dropped Joey off at his apartment, he hadn't gone right home. At the Sixth Street and Somerset intersection, a pale convertible shot past him on the cross street.

Rightly, he'd assumed it was Duke.

Why had he chased Duke? Well…he couldn't answer that. The realization that Duke was headed for the mill came _after_ Tristan already followed as far as the heavily wooded hills flanking the city's furthest eastern edge.

He wasn't even headed for the woods to _begin_ with; in fact he was considering heading home. Forty-five minutes alone on his motorcycle hadn't helped sort the problem with Joey…so why should he waste more gas?

Sorting the problem with Joey out was going to take more than forty-five minutes, Tristan admitted, and drew away from the window when he started to shiver. The entire day had been at sharp angles, from the moment he woke up…even before that. He was no longer sure if he was the same person – or if he'd ever been that person to begin with. He flopped on his bed and stared up at the wall. Above his bed were photos, tacked carefully into the drywall. In the low light they were little more than dark rectangular holes. But he knew them.

The one he always saw first was Joey. The bright hair caught the sun and washed out. It was spring in the photograph – the birthday that Tristan's parents helped him pay for his first motorcycle.

He knew that in the photo was a sponge aimed for his head, trailing a jet of soapy water. It had been hurled by a blond boy, conned into helping him wash the road grime off of the used Yamaha.

It was childish, but he wanted to go back to that day. He'd never kissed Joey for any other reason than a practical joke. He'd never met Duke Devlin; never experienced the confusion that came with simply being in the older boy's presence.

On that day, Serenity was the only kind of 'cute' he noticed and the swimsuit section of a department store catalog made his weekend. Along with that came an insidious thought – had he ever looked at the guys' section for the same reason, and never realized it?

Or looked at…Joey?

 _No! Don't do that!_ He had enough trouble as it was, without asking questions like that.

Just deal with it _now_.

His skin felt like it had a life of his own. When he dared to think about Duke's hands on his chest, it burned with heat despite the cool shiver spreading down his spine. In the wake of those feelings came a sharp stab of guilt.

He'd let Joey get his hands _under_ his shirt. Between the rough groping and hasty kisses, beyond the shock…where Tristan expected it to feel wrong, it…hadn't. It didn't hurt. It was only different. The concept of men together never scared him…it was the idea of letting _anyone_ get that close to him.

Letting someone that close was…a lot nicer than he'd thought it would be.

He'd never given the idea of _real_ love much thought, had he?

Now, wait just a damn minute. Where had _that_ come from? He was _not_ in love with Joey. But being with Joey like that hadn't felt strange so much as simply untried. What if it happened again? Was he going to go run in front of a truck again? Run down his friends again?

Adrenaline pounding from nearly killing himself on the road, angry at himself and at Joey – afraid that he might have gotten _Duke_ hurt – he used the other boy as a scapegoat. If he was Duke, he would have deckedhimself for being such an ass.

When had he started to think about Duke again?

Tristan rolled onto his side, face to the wall. The ponytailed boy was as damn good at slithering into his thoughts as he was at insinuating himself between Tristan and Serenity. Or between Tristan and Joey. The brunet blinked, recalling the hands on his chest once more…and the way Duke leaned toward him in the water…like he wanted to…

The idea that Duke came onto _him_ …was completely ridiculous.

Duke? Liked _guys_?

That wasn't possible.

'But you would have said the same thing about Joey _yesterday_ ,' his logical mind whispered. Tristan told it to shut the hell up if it wasn't going to be helpful.

More than likely, Duke was just leaning forward to shove Tristan away – didn't he take off a few seconds later?

Forget where his hands were. That had to be an accident.

Guilt whacked him on the back of the head. He shouldn't be thinking about either Joey or Duke like this. And if he _was_ going to do it, the least he could do was think about them one at a time.

It was too much. In the span of twelve hours, he'd gone from never questioning his heterosexuality to questioning not only _his_ , but the sexuality of his two closest friends. Was this his fault? What had he done?

'Isn't that obvious?' The derisive little voice whispered again.

"Shut up," Tristan groaned out loud.

He didn't know what to do. He didn't know how Joey felt – he wasn't really sure how _he_ felt. The blond had stayed with him…he'd taken Joey home. That counted for something, right? Come to think of it…hadn't Joey started it?

That's _right_. He _had_. Tristan's entire world would have still been about summer and boredom and the hot drudge of learning how to dance if Joey hadn't leaned over and kissed him.

This was _Joey's_ problem, _not_ his.

Let Joey deal with it. He'd gotten the ball rolling, he could decide what to do with it now.

Something seemed distinctly wrong about that. Tristan never made Joey face something on his own if there was something he could do. But then again, hadn't he _already_ done enough? He shouldn't have let Joey do that…if he hadn't, they would both just be wonderingnow – could have dismissed it as an abstract thought.

It was too late for that.

Besides. He knew his best friend. The conversation in Tristan's basement made it clear that Joey was new at this too. He could guess at what Joey had done when he got home at last – hid from his dad, sat down in his room and blanked out for a while. Gone inside himself to the place he vanished when he wanted to think.

Tristan could see him doing it as clearly as if Joey was beside him, rather than twelve blocks away. He guessed too, that the decision Joey was likely to make was going to hurt. Sternly, Tristan insisted to himself that it didn't matter, so long as the other guy still wanted to be around him.

He didn't sleep until the early hours of the morning, when exhaustion finally overcame his worries.

His last thought was of Duke. Caught at last between sleeping and waking, his subconscious mind slipped out of its frantic circles. He couldn't stop it from replaying the scene at the pond…

_What if I hadn't leaned away?_

…couldn't stop himself from finishing it.


	10. Chapter 10

Joey leaned against the wall of his apartment building, soaking wet. After half an hour of sitting on the edge of his bed with his head almost between his knees, for no particular reason, he'd gotten up, gone back downstairs to the street, and started to walk.

And walk.

And walk.

His neighborhood was a rough one. He lived about ten minutes' fast walk from school in one direction, and about five from the business district the other way. Traffic was heavy as always, though most people were smart enough to never stop. The headlights flashed like a passing train against his ceiling, from one window in his corner room to the other.

Joey took a deep breath and pushed away from the rough concrete wall, and started to walk again. It was better than doing nothing. No amount of running would get him away from himself – but walking, if anything, made it easier to think.

The buildings here didn't top four or five stories, but their shadows dropped across the sidewalks and the street. Headlights shone around the corner, and Joey instinctively ducked into a doorway. It might be the cops. He didn't want to be arrested for breaking curfew – didn't want to make up something for why he was out so late when the cops called his place. Not that his dad would care – Joey just didn't feel like dealing with him.

Funny. He was more worried about the cover story than getting caught by the cops. Should he just tell his dad that he was out trying to steal a car? It'd be better than the truth.

_Freaked out 'cause I just got back from almost humping my best friend._

Yeah.

Definitely going with the grand-theft auto. Given the two options, he figured his father would be _less_ likely to beat his ass over that than finding out that his kid was gay.

…Gay?

Wait. _Not_ gay. Had a few sort of gay thoughts. Tried out kissing another guy. _Not gay_. Liking somebody…holding somebody didn't count for that. If it _did_ , he'd have been gay for Yugi for a couple of years now. It was just a few hours…things got a little out of control.

That was all. Just him typically acting before he thought things through.

"Aw, fuck," Joey muttered, slouching in the doorway after the car had passed, "who the hell am I tryin' to kid?"

Though the afternoon was mostly a blur, he knew that he'd done it first. Brought up Duke first. Asked the questions first. Kissed Tristan first. Made a move when he wasn't even sure how _he_ felt. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

Now…maybe not so good.

For years, whenever Joey bothered to look ahead, his future included Tristan comfortably in it. Best friend. The title was Tristan's because…it was. Because nobody else sounded right with that name. He cared about Yugi, but the title went to Tristan first, and that counted for something.

Without really picturing it, Joey just _knew_ that the tall brunet was in his life for keeps. Until recently, the spot marked out for him was at Joey's side as the constant companion. The friend with the bottomless supply of strength. The best _friend_. He had never looked at it as anything else, just because there was nobody to hit him on the back of the head and point it out.

Until now. Now…somebody hit him so hard that he was on his knees. And…he couldn't see his way clear anymore. The comfortable place where Tristan had been was torn open for scrutiny. Like a bruise from a baseball thrown too hard, it hurt to touch. Like a bruise, he couldn't resist touching it, just to see if it still hurt.

The headlights passed, and when it was safe to go out again, he straightened and started walking once more.

Nothing was right anymore. Tristan wasn't going to stay where he put him for long, and yesterday they'd just been best friends and now that _word_ kept sneaking into his head whenever he thought about the other boy…

 _NOT gay,_ his reflexive thought retorted forcefully again, insisting that one afternoon didn't make somebody gay all their lives. _I don't know if he's gay. Maybe he's not._

What if he wasn't…?

Joey jammed his hands into the pockets of his jeans and hunched his shoulders. His best friend? Tristan wouldn't play with him like that. Tristan might tease him, but he'd _never_ play with Joey's feelings over something this…this…

This what? This 'important'? What made it life-or-death? Two guys could beat the living shit out of each other and not get called on it, but if they _kissed_ , then it was suddenly some big deal?

'Don't forget the humping part,' his memory added dryly, 'had his legs locked around you like he was never going to—'

Joey told the sudden onrush of visuals to go the _fuck_ away, thank-you, but the drag of denim and the sensation of Tristan's knees hooked over his hips stubbornly persisted. Geez. What did a guy have to do to quit thinking about that?

'Stop making out with your buddies.'

_We DIDN'T make out!_

'Says you,' the memories retorted, throwing up the foggy sensation of hands in his hair and a wet tongue in his mouth. He missed a step and faltered to a stop. Great. He couldn't even beat his own head. Except maybe beat it against a wall…which he was contemplating just for the distraction it offered.

This wasn't normal. Not in any way, shape or form. None of this was normal.

But then, lately, real dragons the size of a house were _normal_. Magic and reincarnation, omens, curses, fate and card games from a couple thousand years ago were _normal_.

Yet his best friend almost having sex with him on his basement floor…was _not_?

He decided that he wanted what he had with Tristan to go back to being normal, no matter what the definition. He'd just tell Tristan that. Tristan would understand. Tristan would be happy as hell that he didn't want to do it again.

…Ouch. Resentment towards the brunet surfaced.

His conscience sighed at him. It reminded him that he never had to doubt Tristan – his best friend proved over and over that he would do anything for him. If Joey wanted to, he could probably talk the other boy into it. But that wouldn't be right. And standing where he was now, between going to something he _could_ see the end of and something that he _couldn't_ , Joey didn't want the risk. Risking his own ass was one thing. Risking the one person who'd been with him through everything was another.

Joey pulled his hands out of his pockets, rubbing at the red crescents on his knuckles from the too-tight jeans. He looked up, saw the squares of light coming from open windows in the apartment buildings rising overhead. There were people…some passing before the windows, blocking the light for a moment or two…some who folded their elbows on the sills, heads and shoulders silhouetted against the light. Walking down here, watching them, watching the dark and empty windows beside them, he felt an unexpected loneliness.

He'd explain things to Tristan tomorrow. It was time to go home.


	11. Chapter 11

"Trip me up again and I swear I'm gonna bust your ass!"

 

"I didn't do it on purpose, you wuss!"

The lack of response to the insult made Duke look over his shoulder in surprise. He'd left them to practice on their own for a few minutes, and was picking through the discs Téa left for her 'students.' Several seconds of silence ticked off before he realized something was very wrong.

Joey and Tristan were _staring_ at each other. Just staring. _Again_. That made the third time this morning that the blond boy couldn't come up with an automatic retort. He sat on his knees, gingerly touching his forearm where skidding across the polished floor rubbed it red. "Eh…I am not." Joey retorted blandly, and broke from exchanging glares with Tristan to see that Duke was watching them. "What the hell're _you_ looking at?"

It really was too much to resist.

"Oh…pardon me," Duke replied smoothly, straightening from where he leaned over the rack of jewel cases, "should I give the lovebirds a moment?"

Both boys rounded on him. Though he was anticipating their irritation, the unexpected heat from those glares made even _him_ squirm a little.

"It's no big deal," Tristan dropped his gaze first. Duke's eyes snapped to him then, searching the lowered face for guilt. He'd said something about last night to Joey. He _had_ to have said something. That was the only explanation for the long stares…the trailing sentences…the uneasy silences.A smirk rose automatically to cover the sinking burn of betrayal.

"Shut up, Duke," Joey retorted with more than the usual force, while Tristan stood like a cast bronze figure at his side. Normally, he would have grabbed Joey's arm as the fallen boy struggled to his feet. As Duke watched, Tristan moved forward instinctively to do just that.

Halfway there, his hands faltered. Fell back.

Joey looked up at him, and something passed between the two boys.

Duke's brow furrowed at the silence. Suddenly the tension rose, intense and almost tangible. His gaze flicked back and forth between them, forgetting his own troubles for the moment as it became increasingly obvious that the uneasiness filling the studio actually had very little to do with him. Something was wrong. Had they fought?

But he'd seen them fight plenty of times. There was never much restraint unless it came from someone else's hands. In most cases, someone threw a punch, someone retaliated, and it was over. No grudges held.

This didn't _look_ like a grudge. But it didn't look like things were very comfortable, either.

"Whatever," Duke shrugged, both to the boys and to his own internal worries, "you guys want to get back to what we're _supposed_ to be doing anytime soon? Or do you need some more time to sort this out?"

"Sort out what?" Joey asked with patent innocence, still rubbing his forearm.

Tristan glared at the back of Joey's head, before dragging his eyes up to Duke's. The expression vanished. "Mind your own business," he said, monotone. There was no force behind the words, as if he'd simply said them by rote.

Duke's eyes narrowed. Since when couldn't he goad the younger boy into an argument? " _Fine_ ," He snapped, "I'll mind my _own_ business. And since you idiots would rather argue than—"

"—We weren't arguing," Tristan retorted.

"—I'll work out by myself. And the pair of you can watch if you want, since you seem to like doing that…"

Both boys winced, and Duke's superior smirk widened. Joey's eyes narrowed. "Goddammit, why the hell do we hafta keep doing this?" He took a step forward, fists clenched. "You like torturing us or something?"

"While I'll admit the thought of torture _has_ crossed my mind," Duke answered with a flip of his ponytail, "I _hardly_ think of learning to waltz as a punishment."

"That's what _you_ say, dice boy," Joey muttered.

"And your opinion matters…" Duke put his head on one side, feigning curiosity, "…because…?"

"'Cause I'm tired of doing this shit, because it's _lame_."

"Joey!" Tristan hissed, finally penetrating the invisible barrier between himself and his friend as he gripped Joey's shoulder. The touch was electric – even Duke could tell from several paces away. The blond's deep brown eyes flew wide, and he turned his head with agonizing slowness to look at Tristan from beneath his shaggy bangs.

Duke's posture went rigid. No matter how unbelievable a development might be, when the proof stared a person in the face…it was a bit hard to deny.

He felt anger growing, unbidden. Tristan's behavior at the pond made sense now. Téa was right about him. About _both_ of them. Whether _they_ knew it or not was a different story. Without ever knowing that they'd done it, the pair had played a very cruel trick on him. Duke's sense of revenge kicked in, heedless to logic.

Oh, they were going to _pay_.

Joey shrugged off Tristan's hand, but calmed nevertheless. "I'll do what I hafta, but I still think it's lame," he repeated, sullenly. His childish attitude only irritated Duke further, though it was hardly an unusual response.

"I wouldn't want you to do anything that you find 'lame,' Joey," he replied at last, accenting the other's word with a fine edge of scorn. "And since the two of you are _so_ far ahead already…I think I could find something more _challenging_."

Tristan heard the artificial sweetness in Duke's voice, and once again found himself fighting the urge to bolt as his subconscious mind screeched 'TRAP!'

"I'm listenin'…" Joey said, obviously not in the possession of such a sixth sense. Seriously, how did the guy ever manage to win at Duel Monsters?

"I don't think—" Tristan started warily.

"Well, you can't have everything," Duke's patronizing tone grated, and Tristan bristled at the slight. The taller boy's shoulders squared and made Tristan look even bigger when he was angry, Duke noted with perverse satisfaction. He had both boys completely at his mercy until Téa returned on Sunday night. Regardless of how much they came to hate him in these last few days, they _were_ going to know that he existed. They would be so awareof his presence that they'd feel it for days afterward when their shoulders hurt and their arches ached.

And he'd make them nervous as hell while he was doing it.

"I'm going to teach you how to rumba."

* * *

Joey felt Tristan jerk beside him when Duke issued his 'challenge.' He moved another step away, not happy with how he could tell what Tristan was doing without looking at him. The spot on his shoulder where the brunet's hand had been still felt the pressure, and he tugged at the arm of his tee-shirt.

 

He glared into Duke's aggravating smirk, ready to make the older boy eat his superior tone. The night before was telling on him, and at this point if Duke had said 'I'm going to teach you how to feed yourself slowly and painfully to a school of piranhas,' Joey would have done it just to get one more person off of his back.

Well…maybe not that extreme. 'I'm going to teach you how to dress in drag and hit on men in the shopping mall.' There. Bet he even _knew_ how to do that.

"Rumba?" Joey echoed, "One of those sequin-jumpsuit deals?"

"The sequins are optional," Duke rolled his eyes, "but hey, if that floats your boat…"

"We're supposed to waltz," Tristan cut in, "That's all Téa said we had to do."

"So you'll learn to rumba in your spare time," Duke tilted his head and shrugged one shoulder at the brunet's noise of protest. He was really getting into this 'teacher' thing…adopted that annoying high school professor's attitude that it was _Tristan's_ problem, not his, "Oh, come on. You can't spend _every_ night trying to run people down."

The oldest boy's lips twitched, quirked into a secretive smile.

Seeing this, Joey shot Tristan a questioning look. Tristan's gaze flicked to him, then to Duke. Tristan shrugged.

Joey watched them both, and huffed in impatience at the sudden stalemate and lack of activity. At the prospect of learning something new – the sexy dancing that Duke had presumably been at yesterday, to boot – he quickly forgot about the uncomfortable dynamic from a few minutes earlier.

Standing here without moving was making him hot, anyway.

"Tch…suck it up, Tristan! This is gonna be a helluva lot more fun than all that slow stuff." He elbowed the other boy, looking away quickly before Tristan could throw him that _look_ that he'd gotten so damn good at today. That sort of nervous 'what do you _want_ from me?' look that Tristan had this morning when Joey laid things out.

That look was starting to piss him off. He shoved his hands in his pockets, looking down as he shifted his weight so that he didn't see Tristan.

'what do you _want_ from me?'

_I don't know, all right? Geez…didn't hear any good ideas coming out of you, either, man._

"So can we get started already?"

* * *

Tristan's temper simmered slowly throughout the next three hours. Busy with learning the new steps, Joey acted like he'd forgotten all about yesterday. And that – Tristan reminded himself – was what he wanted anyway, of course. That would have been bearable, on its own.

 

Duke was the one making it hard to deal with. When Joey agreed to learn, the ponytailed boy transferred the majority of attention to the blond. His demeanor changed…he was funny, charming…almost _human_.

But there was a slick, fake feeling to it at the same time, one that he didn't like. The person teaching Joey to rumba wasn't the same person who listened eagerly yesterday when Tristan explained the unpleasant noise coming from Duke's transmission. He'd sensed it earlier, and knew with certainty that his 'instructor' had a second motive for doing this. Wait. What was his _first_ motive?

Good question. Right up there with 'why the _hell_ does Duke have his hands on Joey's hips?'

"Shift your weight to your right foot."

Duke's body was seamed firmly up against Joey's back – or if there was any air in between them, it was a damn thin line. Joey looked a little flustered, obviously having trouble concentrating, especially when Duke's hands moved from the waistline of his jeans and down to his outer thighs. Now hang on just a minute. That was a foul in any kind of sport.

They were both hot and damp, and with the body heat, someone's aftershave came on a little too strong. Duke's hair was loose in the blue tie wrapped around it, and hung in disorganized straggles against the back of his neck.

"I'm _on_ my right foot already!" Joey protested, voice hitching up a little.

" _No_. Before you start, you have to step to the left, _then_ shift your weight from your left to your right, and _then_ forward."

"So…wait. I gotta go _this_ way _before_ I can start? What kinda whacko invented this dance?"

The only reply was a helpless groan. Joey shrugged, scraping his hands through his hair in frustration at not understanding something that must be obvious to everyone else. "It don't make any sense when ya say it like that! I don't get it – why do I hafta dance _before_ I can dance?"

Tristan took Duke's place at Joey's back when the other boy abruptly tore away from his student and stalked away. The brunet and blond watched with a little worry. Joey looked over his shoulder at Tristan. "Well it doesn't," he mouthed silently.

Tristan spread his hands. He didn't know what the hell Duke was getting at either.

Duke whipped the remote off of the top of the stereo. "The rumba…" he began as he walked back, boot heels clicking underneath his words, "…is three beats." He shoved the remote into his pocket and ripped out the binding on his ponytail savagely. "The music isn't in three," Duke went on, grunting softly as he hastily gathered the hair into a tighter tail. "It's in _four_. Two steps for the first two beats, one step for the next two."

He spread his hands, commanding that they watch, and pointed down. "Step to the side for the first two beats. Like this."

Left foot to the side. Right foot swept in quickly alongside, shift weight, slow step forward with the left. Side step, weight change, slow step backward. Pause. "Get it?"

Joey and Tristan exchanged worried glances. Duke did all that without _ever_ looking at his feet. They knew they were doomed.

The ponytailed boy sighed dramatically, and looked for a moment as though he were reconsidering his offer. And stopped looking like he was the professional. Just...looked like Duke again. "Why me? Why am _I_ stuck with two of the most hard-headed—"

"You ever think that maybe it's you with the problem, dude?" Tristan interrupted.

Duke, unhappy that he'd been cut off mid-insult, bristled. "And by _that_ , you mean…?" He snapped.

"Nothing," Tristan shrugged in response, "You just said before that you don't know how to teach. How'd _you_ learn?"

The ponytail twitched. When Duke's eyes on him became uncomfortable and the silence stretched, the brunet held his hands up and rolled his shoulders once more. "Hey, look, we don't hafta do this…if it's too hard on you—"

"No!"

Joey started, flinching at Duke's unexpected outburst. Duke swallowed, squared his frame and tucked his hands in his pockets. He dropped his head, then brought it up again, expression smoothed.

"No," he repeated levelly, "it's not. You're right – I'm not good at teaching. Well. Not good at teaching _this_ , anyway." A preoccupied, predatory smile drifted across his features, vanishing when he realized that he was the subject of two intense stares. "So. For once, I'm going to need your help."

"That'll be a first," Joey snorted. Tristan nudged him, and he nudged back.

"If I'm going too fast, or you don't get something, tell me. Considering that it's _you_ …" Duke needled, smiling indulgently on the blond boy, who narrowed his eyes, "…I can imagine that it'll take a while to sink in."

"You sayin' I'm dumb?"

"Well, if I'm wrong…" Duke stepped delicately backward, inviting the other boy to follow him, "prove it."

Eager to do just that, Joey came right along after him.

Duke looked up then, spying Tristan watching them move away. The big brunet looked uncertain, but when those hazel eyes flicked up to meet the green ones taunting him from across the room, there was no denying that he didn't want to be left behind.

"You gonna stay over there and pout, bud?" Joey turned back and grinned.

All he had to do was follow.

He did.


	12. Chapter 12

Two days later, with the thermometer holding steady at eighty-three degrees in the shade, Joey and Tristan practiced on their own in Tristan's backyard. Living in suburbia only left the Taylors a postage stamp of grass and a single large tree. It was surrounded by a privacy fence, and was cooling now as the afternoon slid away.

 

With a desire to practice and none of their own music to work with, the two boys spent the first portion of the evening experimenting with the Taylor CD collection. To their surprise, a remarkable amount of music that wasn't 'Latin' at all had a beat that they could work with. It was easier to rumba to music that didn't sound like it would've been more at home in an elevator.

Much less lame, Joey insisted. Because that was the most important thing.

Tristan's older sister Erin caught them an hour ago, and now commandeered a folding beach chair underneath the solitary maple to watch. She held the boys' stereo balanced precariously on her knees. Her swollen belly took up the rest of her lap.

Joey was getting into the lyrics of the song as they worked out, mouthing them without singing. He closed his eyes and arched his back when he and Tristan rolled forward. Bent his knees and dropped his body low as though he were driving every ounce of effort into holding the long notes.

Erin watched him, laughter bubbling from deep within her chest. "So help me, if I go into labor early because of you…"

"Then you gotta name the kid after me!" He clowned, circling his partner, falling easily into the rhythm.

Tristan tried to ignore him. The blond slid over and bumped him hard with his hip.

"— _Inch_ from pounding your ass, _pal_ ," Tristan threatened as he recovered from the consequent stumble. Joey straightened; stared at him.

Obviously, neither one had actually considered the double meaning behind that statement until just now.

Erin's presence was suddenly excruciating, whereas a moment ago she had merely been a spectator. Tristan rubbed the back of his neck, scooting in reverse, and opened his mouth to apologize.

"Eh, don't be s'cranky," Joey interrupted his train of thought, and pushed his shoulder before slipping across the lawn to where their very pregnant DJ sat with the stereo.

"You wanna start that one again?" He asked, smiling down at her with artless appreciation. Charmed as always by her brother's companion, Erin grinned and backed the disc up to the beginning of the song. The curve of her stomach was at the right level to touch, and Joey patted the front of her tee shirt, smiling over his shoulder at Erin before he walked back to Tristan.

The brunet boy arched an eyebrow at him, though he was smiling too.

"What?" Joey asked, drawing out the word until it seemed set on springs. "I want her to name the kidlet after me." His grin drew up on one side, teasing.

"She's not gonna name it after you," Tristan countered, "Give the poor kid a complex."

The music started, and they didn't speak for some time after that, intent on trying to match paces. Tristan was actually starting to enjoy himself as the minutes passed, laughing for no reason – maybe a little triumph – when they managed to move in sync.

An hour later, both boys flopped down onto the grass with an utter disregard for the 'chiggers' that Tristan's mother came into the backyard to warn them about. It was dark and getting darker, and the grass was cool and pleasantly damp with dew.

Erin excused herself, insisting that the stereo needed to be taken in before it got wet. Joey sweet-talked her into bringing them both a bottle of Gatorade, which she did.

"I hate Lemon Ice," Joey complained idly, sucking on a bottle of the very same.

"Trade you," Tristan offered his across the grass to where his friend sprawled, "Something berry."

"Berry what?"

"Like I know? Just berry. It's not Lemon Ice, so what d'you care?"

"Ain't you afraid of gettin' my cooties?" The blond boy snickered, and then both of them started to laugh. The sound was nervous. They switched bottles and went back to being quiet.

Fireflies came out, winking on and off in the dark. Tristan rolled his head to the side; felt the heaviness of exhaustion, and watched the sky slowly purple to the west. He was tired, but he felt really good. Hadn't expected to feel this good, given how close Joey was to his elbow, but really…

"Lookit." Joey said unexpectedly.

"Huh?" Tristan turned his eyes towards his friend. The Gatorade bottle balanced in the center of his chest fell off and sloshed into the grass.

"Lookit – up there. Y'see?"

Tristan could only just make out the darker outline of Joey's pointing arm against the indigo sky. He snorted. "I don't see anything."

"Yeah you do," Joey argued, "blinking red lights. Y'gotta see 'em up there."

"Oh." Tristan squinted, turning his eyes up to the sky overhead, and made out a pair of bright red lights flashing on and off in the middle of pinhole stars. "Bet that's a jet."

"Wonder where it's going."

This took Tristan by surprise, not being among the usual kinds of things Joey wondered over. "Come again?"

"Just kinda wonder sometimes why dice boy's still here."

The train of conversation switched tracks without warning and started rolling rapidly downhill. Tristan turned over onto one elbow and stared at his friend in the dark. "You're not making sense," he said.

"Y'mean _you_ don't wonder what's keepin' himoff a jet like that?" The grass hissed softly as Joey shifted. He folded his arms behind his head and lay back again. "He's always long gone when it gets boring around here."

"Whatcha mean, always? He's only been here a coupla years."

The blond turned his head a little toward Tristan; looking at him was easier when he couldn't see the eyes properly in the dark. "Yanno what I mean," he replied, soberly.

After a minute or two of quiet, Tristan agreed that he did know. "It _is_ a little weird that he's still here."

"Try _major_ weird, bud," On the scent of a mostly direct train of thought and not sure what to do with it, Joey restlessly pushed himself up onto his elbows, and then his hands. "That guy don't _ever_ sit still. He's got an electric ass, I swear, and his battery's always runnin' on full power, yanno? He should be outta here. And last year he said he was _gonna_ be outta here."

"Since when does your memory go past lunch?" Tristan retorted automatically, borrowing time to think.

"Shuddup," Joey replied, without venom, and ran his palms through the grass, searching for his bottle of Gatorade. He found it, wet with dew, and wiped both bottle and hands on his shirt before uncapping the nozzle for another drink. "What…" he interrupted himself, wiping his mouth with the back of one wrist, "…what I don't get is this. _All_ this. The dancin' and the hangin' out and agreein' to teach us how t'do the rumba… 'cause I thought he figured we were losers, same as Kaiba does. And maybe Téa talked him into teachin' us for a while, but she sure as hell didn't make him sign on for nothin' like he's doin' now."

Joey left his own thoughts and focused outward, realizing that he was being stared at. It was even sort of uncomfortable in the dark, but he stared right back, rubbing a wet hand against the back of his neck. "All I'm sayin' is it's weird, bud. Quit lookin' at me like that."

"But…you gotta point."

"I do?" Joey leaned back.

"Well, yeah," Tristan said, and rolled his head back to look up at the sky. He didn't move. If he moved, the dew would soak into his shirt and he'd lose his focus. "You're right. There's gotta be another reason for Duke sticking around. 'Cause you and I both know that he doesn't just do things outta the goodness of his heart."

They both laughed, and then fell abruptly quiet, looking at one another in the dark. It didn't seem to matter how much they both _wanted_ to pretend that Monday afternoon hadn't changed anything. Wherever it went, something was different between the two of them.

It was the first time in four days that Tristan used Duke's given name in front of Joey. Four days that made a huge difference. Now, saying it made him awkward…and at the same time, made him want to say it again.

He wanted to tell Joey about Duke. About the car, about the pond…just wanted to talk about it. Not because it was all _that_ important – though his conscience disagreed on certain key points – but just because it'd feel good to talk to _someone_ about the confusing boy with the green eyes and the weird streak down his face.

"Joey…" Tristan started, hesitantly, and cut off when the same feeling pounced on his stomach that got him when he mentioned Duke.

"Yeah…?" Joey asked.

Something in the tone of the single word made Tristan wonder if hearing it felt that way, too. He sat up. A warm feeling filled his stomach, taking the place of the strange nervous flutter. Why was he not telling Joey about this? He could tell his best friend anything.

Present…situation…notwithstanding.

That didn't make any logical sense, keeping some secrets and telling others when they were all related, but…

"Yoohoo. Earth to Tristan. Did I lose ya?" Pause. Joey sounded uncertain, still waiting for the other boy to explain himself. "Tristan?"

"I gotta tell you something…" Tristan blurted, and before he could stop himself, the whole embarrassing story fell out.

Too fast to be edited.

"…And I think he was gonna kiss me."

* * *

"Whoa, WHOA, bud. How'd you get from drag-racin' to suckin' face?"

 

The admission physically rocked Joey backward. He couldn't define one single clear feeling – everything came shooting down the pipe at once and got into a traffic jam halfway.

He just knew it was a shock and a half. Duke? Duke _Devlin_?

Wait a minute. That explained a lot.

But meanwhile the parameters he'd set based on what he thought _Tristan_ wanted were rapidly turning into bunk.

Joey listened to Tristan unsteadily explain himself a second time, too stunned to speak now. He wasn't deaf. He would have heard it if the other boy was grossed out or pissed off.

Mostly, he just heard scared.

Joey knew what scared sounded like.

Something told him that letting the quiet go for too long was a bad thing. A light in the kitchen of the Taylor house snapped on, edging Tristan's cheek and shoulder in gold.

Joey leaned across the gap between them, trying to fill it with uncertain words. "Buddy, y'know…well…things happen for a reason, like Yugi says. Just…you and Duke, you're friends, and you and me…" he got lost trying to define them, and swallowed hard. "I dunno what's going on. But it's okay, yanno? Whatever."

Why hadn't he said that Tuesday morning? Or hell…Monday night?

'Because you were scared,' his conscience reminded him. Like he needed another reminder. Joey stopped leaning toward Tristan, because the little space between them was almost vibrating and he had the weird thought that if he got any closer the bigger boy was going to break. He cleared his throat, and went on quietly. "So…y'like Duke…huh?"

All he got was a tiny miserable moan. Tristan finished the lean for him, slumping against his shoulder.

Joey swayed under the sudden press of warm weight, but didn't move away.

Didn't really want to.

The tightly-guarded memories from Monday afternoon resurfaced, and tentatively, Joey let his fingertips comb through Tristan's hair.


	13. Chapter 13

_The back road again. This time it had a more familiar feel. Tristan didn't pay attention to the trees flashing past – but he knew somehow that this was the mill road._

_Pale light flickered over the car's massive hood. Again with the car. Why always the car? By some miracle, Duke let him drive._

_This was apparently a magical car, and didn't need to shift – which was good, since he'd never driven a manual in his dreams before._

_He had his right arm up on the back of the bench seat._

_He knew what was coming._

_Warmth spread out from the inside of his elbow as Duke's slender palm settled against his skin. Tristan couldn't take his eyes from the hood and the ribbon of road sliding under the wheels; it was like one of those damned irritating dreams where every time he pulled his head away from the wall it would snap right back._

_But it was Duke, all right. As certainly as if the electric charge that came with the touch wore a nametag._

_He realized that he wanted to stop the car. Finally,_ finally _, the car stopped on its own, and let him turn his head to the side._

_Of course it was Duke. And he was soaked, and water somewhere was reflecting pale spangles like tiger stripes on his skin. This made no sense, because they weren't near the pond. The green eyes glowed in the dark, and Duke shook his head with a laugh, tossing drops of water from his hair._

_It looked uncannily like something out of a swimsuit issue. But that was to be expected._

_Then he started to lean forward across the seat. Tristan held his ground. Because this time he_ knew _what was coming. Duke's other hand left wet skid-marks on his shirt as it slid up Tristan's chest, and his fist tightened on the brunet's elbow._

 _He didn't know what it felt like to kiss Duke. He didn't_ really _feel it. Just the low clench of arousal that came with it. Knowing that it was Duke. That the hands sifting through his hair were Duke's. The older boy climbed into his lap…_

" _So…y'like Duke…huh?"_

_Tristan started. Joey? He started to stammer an apology, looking for the source of the voice._

" _Hey, it's okay man. I like him too."_

_How Joey had gotten behind him, he'd never know, but unexpectedly he was sandwiched between the other two boys. There were the warm bars of Joey's arms around his waist, and Duke's weight firmly in his lap and against his chest…_

_And then someone flashed their headlights. Right in his eyes. Getting brighter and brighter until it_ hurt _even with his eyes closed, and it was all he could think about._

 

* * *

 

Friday morning dawned a little later than usual. Sunlight crept further across the floorboards, inch by inch, stealing through the slats in Tristan's window fan until they drifted across his face. He blinked owlishly into the inconsiderate brightness and groaned when it peeled away the insulating layers of sleep.

Turn off the fucking _headlights_.

Wait. That wasn't right.

Bleary hazel eyes blinked rapidly, sleep rubbed away from the corners by a blunt-ended index finger. Tristan shaded his eyes with his hand and squinted; tried to make some sense of the situation. It was hard to recognize his room at first – _was_ this his room? – until he realized that it was simply a matter of never having seen it from this angle before. His head was at what would normally have been the foot of his bed.

That explained why the sun was in his eyes, too. They felt raw, sore from not enough sleep. He groaned again, softer this time, and tried to roll toward the wall.

'Tried' being the key word. It was futile. His comforter was just too heavy, and when he tried to push it off, it made small noises of protest and refused to be moved.

…Noises?

Tristan looked down.

Joey looked up at him.

The blond boy was sprawled half on top of him – no small feat considering the minimal space of the single mattress.

They continued to stare at one another in silence for several long moments, both pairs of eyes connected to brains that were simply too fatigued and fogged with sleep to process the situation.

Half-remembered snippets of the previous night dropped back into place, linking up in a rush.

Practice. Late. He'd told… and then he'd…oh, _shit_ …

Joey stayed. The obvious truth in that statement was the warm body weighing him down. Too warm. Too warm too close too _right now_ …

* * *

_Joey knew he'd been spending too much time at Téa's place when the studio showed up in his dreams._

 

 _It was noon in the large room – the light was mellow, just like always. At first he thought the place was deserted, but then he heard Tristan's voice, and Duke's (Goddammit, bad enough that now he'd had_ two _dreams with Tristan in them, but_ Duke _now? What'd a guy have to do for a little peace?). Tristan sounded really upset. No way in hell was Joey going to jump him again, so he'd better not start bawling._

_He searched for them, and when he turned, he found them outlined against the western windows. The light was really all he could see – it was blinding where it hemmed around their edges…where their edges didn't meet._

_They were together. It was weird again. They were dancing and talking at the same time, and he really needed to talk to somebody about getting the fucking ballroom dancing out of his head before he started getting into the sequins and the chest hair shirts and the whole bit._

_They ignored him, still dancing. Like he and Téa had been. Except not. They were close. Too close. Parts of them blended together into solid black._

_That pissed him off. He didn't know why. It wasn't going to work. He didn't know why he knew_ that _, either. They fought with each other when they were angry at something else. That was it. All the time. Their music was good, he could hear it, but it was easy to throw out of sync._

 _Besides._ He _wanted to dance with Tristan. Maybe he wasn't so sure about Duke – wasn't sure if he trusted him or not, but Joey knew he was_ supposed _to be dancing with Tristan. They were supposed to learn to dance together. Duke was a good teacher but Joey wasn't sure if he could trust the older boy not to trip his best friend up._

 _The music changed and Tristan left Duke to dance with Joey instead. Big broad chest and arms around his neck – soft on the outside and hard in the middle. It was good but not quite…enough. Kind of like stopping before the end of a song. Like getting interrupted before he could get himself off. Like that. Frustrating and not enough. Tristan wasn't telling him but he knew – because it was_ his _dream, goddammit – that it wasn't enough for him either. Something was missing. A big piece._

 _Besides. He really_ did _like Duke, didn't he? It didn't seem fair to leave him out. Not when he was the reason that Tristan was dancing with Joey in the first place._

_Like the thoughts had pulled him, suddenly he was looking right into those green eyes over Tristan's shoulder. Tristan had stopped talking and he wasn't so upset – he shouldn't be, considering that Joey's hands were around his waist – they held onto each other a lot when things got bad and it made sense for him to do it._

_But he was looking into Duke's eyes now and the music…the rhythm…was different again. And the closer Duke got to Tristan, the better it sounded. He wasn't sure what he was going to do if the older boy's hands found_ his _, but this way, with Tristan safely between them, he could dance with both of them and nobody was on the sidelines._

_And the music almost sounded right._

_Almost._

 

* * *

 

Joey looked down, still shaking off remnants of sleep…and froze. He stared with intense, sober concentration, brow furrowing. There was something not right about this, and he needed some distance to figure it out. He dropped both hands to either side of Tristan's chest and pushed himself up. A chunk of cool air rushed between them under the loose tent of sheet.

He _wasn't_ naked, at least. Bare-chested, yes. That was disturbing. But he still had his boxer shorts on.

Why was he taking this kind of inventory? "Uh…"

"Did we—?"

"What?" Joey asked, sitting back and not looking up. Because Tristan didn't have a shirt on either and he couldn't seem to stop studying the bigger boy's chest. Because it looked _much_ bigger, this close.

Because it was easier to look down instead of up.

"You know… _did_ _we_?" Tristan's voice broke.

"Did we _what_? …Oh," Joey corrected himself in the subtext, voice dropping a notch.

Brown eyes linked up again, searching for a lifeline. This had to stop.

"I don't think we did." Joey muttered.

"We'd know, wouldn't we?"

"Yeah…"

Tristan took stock this time. Did he feel tired? Yes. Sweaty? Hell yes. It was hot and mostly airless in this room, and had the situation been different, he would have shoved Joey's too-warm body out of his bed. But the boneless, sated feeling of exhaustion wasn't there. Only leftover tension from being sandwiched in the driver's seat of Duke's car.

That very sudden, very clear memory made him drop his eyes.

Tristan's brain started into the motions of finding a loophole to wriggle through.

He realized what he was doing after the first panicked circle of thought.

He told himself to stop.

Dream-Joey had been cuddled up against his back. _Real_ Joey was sprawled with a knee on either side of Tristan's hips. The blond boy seemed unconcerned about this. He was still staring hard at Tristan. "Are you _sure_ we didn't do anything?" He asked again.

"Why? Are _you_?" Tristan retorted. He wasn't sure he wanted to hear the answer. The implications of a 'no' were a little too much to contemplate.

Then again. So was a 'yes.' So Tristan changed the subject. "Why're you here?"

Blessedly, Joey shifted topics without protest. "You looked beat, bud. And _I_ don't know how to drive your bike and I didn't wanna walk. Too hot to walk. So I left a message on the old man's machine."

This made sense. Tristan nodded, slowly.

What didn't make sense was that Joey was still straddling his lap.

"That was okay, right? I mean, your mom said she didn't care…" Joey asked anxiously. Like suddenly he was re-thinking the idea of sleeping over and waking his best friend up with a good hip-rub.

"Yeah, it was fine, Joey." Without thinking about it, Tristan ran his knuckles along the inside of Joey's elbow. Just doing it because it was there. Because, given the situation, it seemed all right to do that.

Joey looked down, watching Tristan's hand brushing against his skin. Tristan continued to watch Joey, eyes half-closed. He wasn't sure what those dreams were about. They were scary. What wasn't scary was Joey. He'd known the blond boy for most of his life…was in his memories almost from the beginning. The longer he thought about it, the less frightening everything looked. They'd already kissed once. Twice. Well…heh. After the second one, he sort of lost count that afternoon.

Fighting it seemed ridiculous. Joey wasn't moving off of him, and maybe…maybe he'd thought through everything since Tuesday morning. That morning it almost hurt to breathe.

Now…not so much.

Maybe he wouldn't mind if they did it again.

* * *

Tristan's hand slid up the inside of Joey's arm, still just brushing the bony ridges of knuckles along the plane of soft skin. The blond head tilted, watching its progress until it slipped out of sight against his collarbone. Joey could still feel it after that, curling in the darker blond hair at the nape of his neck.

 

He looked back down at Tristan's face. The eyes that met him there were a touch lighter than his own. They reflected the same kind of hesitation that he felt…the same fear…

They'd never _really_ hurt each other deliberately as friends. Not without a good reason. But this was worse. This could hurt like hell. Joey could see Tristan's eyes, begging him not to do it. Not to hurt him. It wasn't going to be like a punch in the gut or a bruised jaw. With this…even after the black and blue faded, the bruise was still going to be there under their skin. And they'd know those bruises were there.

Those were bruises that could kill the friendship they had right now. Did he _really_ want to take that chance? No…no he didn't…he couldn't stand the thought of losing Tristan…

…But if he pulled away now, it'd happen anyway. Pulling away would leave a bruise too. He could tell.

Joey didn't understand. His feelings got tangled up between the 'what if…?' and the 'why not…?' and the confusion left in place of them was irritating. But in the meantime, he remembered what it felt like Monday night. And _last_ night. When he'd had Tristan leaning against him, not asking for anything.

Tristan never demanded anything. Not even now, while his hand just rested, quietly, on the back of Joey's neck.

But he wanted it. And hell…Joey wanted it too.

This was okay. To fuck with everything else.

He leaned down, slowly, letting Tristan guide him along by the nape of his neck. Mouths met and opened, less hesitant than before. His elbows bent, and he came to rest on top of the supine boy's broad, powerful chest. Joey's forearms touched down on the mattress, nested around Tristan's upper arms, and his hands curled over the warm curves of shoulders on either side.

This was mellower than the last. Warmer. Joey wasn't sure what was going on, but he was too tired and too hot already to do any kind of rushing and pushing.

The sheet settled down over his back, touching lightly. He forgot about it in a minute. Whatever this was, whatever it meant, it didn't feel like a bruise.

"We're gonna be late," Joey muttered after a few minutes. The sincerity in the comment wouldn't have fooled his own sister. Tristan was kissing his neck. Where the hell had he gotten so good at kissing?

"I don't care," Tristan replied against his neck.

"Oh. Me neither," Joey agreed. He didn't move. And Tristan had stopped kissing his neck. This was kind of annoying, because he'd gotten _right_ to a good spot underneath his ear. "…but we're gonna be in a lot of trouble. 'Cause…you know…Mai and…"

Mai and Serenity. His sister. Hang on a minute. Something didn't make sense here.

"So you…I thought…but you were all over…" Joey stumbled on it, since it felt two kinds of uncomfortable trying to talk about how Tristan wanted his sister. Used to want—? Had that changed? "D'you like…girls still? And guys?"

For a while, there was only the hum of the fan in the window, causing the yellow bars of morning light on their skin to flicker. Tristan relaxed backwards, shoulders touching down on the mattress. "I like you, Joey," he said, shrugging.

Whoa. That was a lot to process. Tristan _liked_ him? As in…that whole basement thing wasn't just messing around? _That_ kind of 'like'? If Tristan had meant it differently, he would have clarified. That wasn't the kind of words somebody tossed around when you were sitting almost buck-naked in his lap.

Last night, he hadn't exactly _admitted_ to liking Duke. So maybe he was wrong?

Joey told his worries to hit the showers. Shit. Five minutes after he decided he was gay, and already the drama starts.

Wait. _Not_ gay. Because girls were still—

Oh, fuck it. Whatever. He'd slap a label on it after breakfast.

Tristan was waiting for something. He could see it in the other's face. Funny, it was harder to look at him than it used to be. His cheeks were going red hot every time their eyes met. What was he waiting for? Oh. Right.

"I like you too, Tristan." It wasn't a lie. Maybe not _completely_ honest, but it wasn't a lie, either. He pushed himself back up onto his hands. "You got anything to eat except those damn hay-flakes?"


	14. Chapter 14

Duke crossed the expanse of empty studio floor to the benches under the southerly windows. He raised a knee to rest gently on the surface, and pressed his palms to the windowsill, leaning forward to survey the street until his forehead nearly brushed the glass.

 

Warm morning sunlight was just leaking through the windows to his left. Though the shades were drawn, the filtered light and phantom heat began the alarmingly fast process of chasing away the cool air.

The street was empty below.

The boys were late.

Hardly surprising. Duke wondered how long it would take them to slip back into old habits. With a sigh, he folded his knee beneath him and sat down, grimacing at the way the finish on the windowsill was already sticky with humidity. Forecasts predicted record temperatures today, not to mention that heat index that magically shifted the feeling of it up a couple notches. He didn't like this. If there was any other option, he would insist on air-conditioning. As it was, he'd just have to suffer.

He didn't like pointless suffering. Oh, the irony.

Duke shifted his weight back and raised his arms, folding his hands behind his head to get two fistfuls of his collar. Once he'd ducked his face through the collar of the mottled gray tank top, he bowed his head so his ponytail wouldn't catch. The shirt pulled smoothly over his head with a hiss and he let it drop to the side.

He leaned his forearm on the sill and looked out at the street again when the sound of an engine similar to Tristan's motorcycle flared. It was starting up, not passing through, but he looked anyway. Of course it wasn't Tristan; the motorcycle that slid away from the curb across the street was strawberry red and a different make. The console was humped like a camel. Tristan's was one smooth curve from handlebars to seat.

The image of the motorcycle – and of the boy astride it – loomed up clearly in memory. Duke's fingertips drummed restlessly on the windowsill; he closed his eyes. He was so tired of the anxiety that came with the thoughts. Before, he had made tentative plans. Clever flexible plans. He had been proud of himself for them; thought himself so incredibly subtle that he could make his choice without either boy the wiser.

How could he be wrong? But he'd been _so_ wrong, hadn't he? He wasn't inexperienced; he'd felt the thrill of attraction before and acted on it. In that vein, he also knew what it was like to be fought over; what it was like to be led on. …Knew the painful, unsettled need to end a relationship when the feeling faded. Had he thought this situation would finish bloodlessly? Those other situations certainly hadn't.

They were friends of his. His first real friends. Maybe that was why. Of all of his former companions, most were older than him, and none of them shared much more with him than his time. But that didn't make any sense either. He wasn't used to friends – he shouldn't be assuming things about people just because they acted like they gave a damn.

Maybe his confidence got the better of him again. There. That was it. He had assumed that he was subtle enough; smart enough to lure them along, make his choice when one of them responded, and let them think he'd been after that particular boy all along.

In hindsight, he knew the game was wrong. He'd thought he could handle it. But it was getting ahead of him now; there were twists and turns on this path that he hadn't seen coming. The familiar itch to run began niggling faintly at the back of his mind. He still _could_ …

…They'd never be the wiser.

But then Tristan would go back to thinking he was a self-indulgent prick. And Joey would never trust him again. And worse, they'd both think he broke promises.

'Give them more credit than that,' an unexpected little voice brushed against his thoughts. One he didn't hear often.

…Trust?

He trusted them?

Yes, he realized. Yes he did. They might be perverted, irritating, dumb enough about some things to make him want to scream. But he also knew that they were sincere. And they were more mature than he'd ever admit to their faces.

So…they were not dumb. Just unobservant. If he left, they'd probably even guess what was up. He knew he couldn't tell them the truth outright. Tell them that he wanted their asses and couldn't pick which one he wanted more? Sure. It seemed safer to let them figure it out on their own.

Given what he'd seen lately, they were sure to—soon. Duke rolled his head back, groaned, and pressed his hand to the sill to push himself to his feet.

He was still restless. Now that the game wasn't going his way anymore and he couldn't see his way clear to win, he wanted it over with. Didn't want to look sick or pathetic in front of them; didn't want to sacrifice his self-reliance.

Perhaps one of his more patient friends could have come up with a suitable expression for this turn of events.

But, in the language of Joey and Tristan…this _sucked_.

Another motorcycle buzzed up the street, arresting Duke a moment before he left the window. He turned his head and glanced across his shoulder at the street. It was the right motor, and the white Yamaha carried his two boys up to the house and down the alley to the back.

 _His_ boys.

Duke pushed in irritation at the warmth from the unexpected possessive term. He rubbed his hands on his thighs, ignored the impulse to put his shirt back on, and went to the small refrigerator for a bottle of water. He was leaning there when they came through the door.

Something was different. He knew it immediately.

Tristan's right hand swung abruptly, awkwardly forward, and dipped into his pocket as he and Joey skirted the painted screen. The movement drew Duke's eye. He followed it upward, then down the length of each body. They were moving fluidly – posture already drastically improved, especially Joey's. He should be proud of them. Their long legs had lost the uneven lope of youth. The confidence in them was visible.

They looked for him, found him between the refrigerator and the chipped pink filing cabinet, and started his way.

He felt the silly desire to hold his hands out to them, palms up. They moved like young horses, every stride measured, sure, and even. Joey ducked out of the strap of his duffel, shaking his hair, and tossed the pale blue nylon bag in the direction of the benches.

Tristan saw him do it, and followed suit. He hadn't worn a jacket today, and his shoulders moved freely outside of a dark green tank top. His bag, similar to Joey's, was orange.

Duke blinked. Blinked again and swallowed. The tension was gone. Something was confirmed; someone had handed them their pass cards and they were no longer boys. Overnight, they seemed to have left childhood behind.

They _knew_ they were desirable. To someone.

Now _he_ was having trouble breathing.

"Hiya, Teach," Tristan grinned, with none of his earlier hesitation.

"You're late," Duke snapped in irritation. He could almost _feel_ the euphoria coming from of the other boy. Tristan had all the potential energy of a rubber ball. It pissed him off because he didn't understand why. "If you're going to keep changing your schedule, let me know, would you?"

His tone was sarcastic. Tristan stared at him, flummoxed, obviously not expecting to be lectured this early in the day. It gave Duke a little perverse satisfaction to see the younger man off-balance.

"Eh…sorry, Duke," Joey's voice rose over Tristan's shoulder.

Duke looked up as Tristan did, the latter turning to crane his head at the blond. Joey…apologizing? He sounded negligent and lazy, as though he'd only half-heard Duke's statement and was too content to rise to the challenge.

He was facing the benches under the windows, his back to his friends as he dug the black polished dancing shoes out of his duffel bag. "…how 'bout you give us _your_ schedule instead, bud? So we won't walk in on ya prancin' around again." Joey glanced up over his shoulder at them, a wide, playful grin etching dimples in his cheeks. When at last he registered the surprised expressions on his companions' faces, his smile faded. "What?" He asked.

Duke's stomach sank so fast that he felt dizzy.

Joey was wearing an old basketball jersey.

The name _TAYLOR_ was printed in a blue arc from shoulder to shoulder across the back. Like a brand. Like a claim. Duke swallowed hard. He shook his head a little, eyes still locked steadily on that name between Joey's shoulder blades.

"Hello-o? Earth to Duke? I _said_ —what's up, man?"

The voice shook Duke out of his funk, and he tore his gaze away from the heavy blue block letters. Shook his head adamantly.

"Nothing," he said.

* * *

After Duke's initial shock wore off, anger started as a pinprick and then turned into a big, ragged hurt. He knew deep down that it was childish to blame them – he didn't even know for sure if he was right or not – and even _if_ he wasn't just making a _phenomenal_ jump to conclusions, how _he_ felt still wasn't their fault.

 

The temperature in the room rapidly increased, due to the movements of three active bodies. The boys warmed up, complying obediently with Duke's terse commands while the rumba rhythm pulsed around them. Three bodies rolled forward in tandem, dipping down at the hips and knees; sidestep, cross step, backstep, turn. Tristan moved with his eyes closed while Joey watched their hands reaching forward into empty space. Duke…watched them.

It was time to stop feeling sorry for himself. When had he gotten this way? Everyone else saw him with an irritating level of self-confidence, so he ought to be able to live up to expectations.

It was the least he could do.

Two weeks of intensive practice paid off in a big way. The boys had the movements of the waltz down and the basic rumba well in hand, if not mastered. They were as much a joy to watch as to dance with. Duke took masochistic pleasure in letting them have the floor to themselves, while he offered corrections from the sidelines.

They confirmed Duke's suspicions when Joey allowed Tristan to pull him in. Though both were more familiar with leading, the careful distance each boy maintained during earlier practice sessions halved. Liberties were taken that Tristan hadn't dared before – as Duke watched in tense silence, he surprised Joey into backward arch. The blond boy hung there for two beats, suspended and supported only by the broad hand spread against the small of his back, soaking wet hair plastered against his forehead and falling in loose spikes at the back of his neck.

Heedless of his audience, Joey rolled his back and arched a little more as he came up. In silent agony, his teacher watched the powerful hands with their ragged fingernails slide quickly northward against Tristan's chest to catch the curves of his shoulders. All in another two beats. Then Tristan lifted the palm from his left shoulder and locked it in his once more.

Duke swallowed hard. Tristan's gaze left Joey's for a second or two to focus on him, and the green eyes dropped. He felt suddenly lightheaded, the press of the heat too much to compensate for, and stepped back quickly to find the bench beneath the window before his knees buckled. He felt sick. Angry at himself for feeling sick. Guilty. Embarrassed – he'd never felt embarrassed over this before. He couldn't see. They blurred and rippled like heat mirages, and he couldn't focus, and it irritated him.

The music continued to pulse around Duke, too loud and so heavy that it vied with the oppressive humidity as it shook the pit of his stomach. Watching his students just now had roused the strongest feeling of want he'd experienced in a very long time. Not just…the sexual. He wanted to be a part of it…surprise Joey into grinning like that again…find himself braced against Tristan while tense fingertips spread against the curve of his spine. More to that…there was more. Just a desire to be _with_ them. Both of them. How had he ever thought he could choose?

He couldn't put it in so many words. The immediate feelings were more than he could handle.

 _He couldn't handle it_.

The ultimate realization paired with the onset of heat exhaustion did him in. His eyes rolled back in his head as a wave of hot, wet air washed against his skin and his nausea intensified, and he was aware of the clatter of footsteps and hands against his shoulders. Frantic, worried voices registered over that damnably loud rhythm. His vision dimmed and he fell against the arms reaching out almost too late to break his fall.


	15. Chapter 15

Duke awakened to the dull roar of a busy emergency room. He was stretched out flat on his back. It was blissfully cool.

He was aware of his companions, only as warm presences in the space to either side of him. Duke's eyes opened, and he winced at the light, a full-fledged, excruciating headache that now overlaid the roiling nausea.

"He's waking up!" This from Joey, nervous and relieved. Master grasp of the obvious, Duke thought sarcastically, irritated to look so weak in front of the boys. He rolled his head away from the sound, focusing on Tristan, whose forearms were folded on the railing of his bed. He wasn't directly between Duke's eyes and bright fluorescent light and it wasn't painful to look at him.

The hazel eyes were worried, eyebrows up and forehead ridged. He was frowning, not much, but his jaw was tight. He clutched a cellular phone, forgotten in his hand. He'd called an ambulance, more than likely. Duke noted all of this without interest, distracted by the lancing pain between his eyes. He flung one arm over them, shutting out the light, and sighed when he felt a hospital wristband and a pulse monitor wire hit his face.

"My heroes," he grated.

"He's awake all right," Tristan replied shortly, with the aggravation people are prone to display when their concern goes unnoticed. Joey laughed a little nervously.

"The nurse says you're gonna be all right, but Téa sure as hell needs to get air conditioning in that place," Joey said, and Duke tensed when the other's warm, dry palm closed on his, peeling his arm away from his forehead. But the blond merely turned his hand up and pressed the curve of a cup into it. "She also said you gotta drink something."

"What happened?" Duke asked, not feeling like doing anything except keeping his eyes shut, but nevertheless pushed himself against the pillows in order to sit up. He guided the rim of the cup blindly to his lips. It was filled with cool water and a few mostly melted ice chips. After a few swallows, the liquid became more palatable, and he tipped his head back. This was not the wisest decision, as it made his skull pound.

"Whoa, whoa!" A heavy hand rested on his arm, pulling it down. Tristan, by the feel of it. And how the hell could he know that? Duke wondered, could he tell them apart by their calluses now? "She also told us that you've gotta do it slow."

"That's the best way, of course," Duke replied, in as suggestive a voice as he could muster. The other boys exchanged weary looks, lost on Duke as his eyes were still tightly closed.

"If you weren't strapped to a coupla monitors, I'd hit ya for that," Joey retorted, "you're s'posed to be _sick_ , not makin' wisecracks."

"I'm not sick. I'm just…" The pain appeared to come in waves, and Duke breathed a sigh of relief as it lessened, "…tired."

"Maybe that's why the doctors call it 'heat exhaustion' around here," Tristan deadpanned.

Duke's eyes flew open in shock to focus on Tristan, be sure he was telling the truth. He immediately regretted it. "Ow. Fuck. _Ow_." He put the cup down with overdone care on the rolling table by his hip and slumped back against the pillows, hand over his eyes.

Over his head, his two attendants were now exchanging looks of concern. Joey's gaze flicked over Tristan's shoulder toward the nurses' station in the busy emergency ward, then back to the brunet. Tristan followed his gaze, turned back and nodded, then left to get someone.

"You okay, man?" Joey asked Duke after Tristan left. He came around the side of the bed to steal Tristan's abandoned stool, and curled his arms atop the bed's metal tube railing. "You look as miserable as Tris with a hangover."

"Now that you mention it," Duke replied quietly, "I think my skull's going to split open. So…if you wouldn't mind keeping your _voice_ down…?"

"Eh? Oh, uh…yeah. Sure thing," Joey conceded, obediently dropping his volume a few levels. "Tris went to get the nurse."

"Unless she comes with enough painkillers to numb a Percheron, I'm not interested,"

For an instant, Joey poised between laughing off the statement and asking what the hell a 'Percheron' was. "It's not like we're askin' ya to _date_ her or something, ya pervert," he whuffed.

"Huh?" In confusion, Duke forgot himself and blinked at Joey. He looked over the blond's shoulder at the woman in candy-printed scrubs Tristan had just summoned from the nurses' station. She had extremely short dark brown hair and long legs. "I think she's more your type," Duke said, and closed his eyes again before he could make any further connections and thus totally embarrass himself while the woman looked him over.

"Ya think so, huh?" Joey replied inattentively, watching her over his shoulder.

"Yeah, you know, tall, dark, and handsome? I hope she's not the strong, silent type, or her bedside manner will be severely lacking."

There was a little, shocked pause. Joey gaped like a landed fish.

"You made it obvious," Duke pointed out.

"Well…I dunno what—" Joey's words bit off as Tristan approached and took up a place at Joey's side. The nurse, clipboard in hand, considered Duke's barrage of monitors with their arcane blips and beeps, and double-checked his chart.

"Mr. Taylor says you have a headache? It looks like you're still running a little hot, Mr. Devlin," she said, half to herself, pressing a thermometer to his ear.

"I bet you say that to all the boys," Duke drawled. Tristan ducked his face behind Joey's shoulder to hide a grimace. The nurse said nothing, but the corner of her mouth twitched.

"You're very lucky. You have a mild case of heat exhaustion, and if your friends hadn't found you and brought you here, it could have been worse."

Brought him here?

Oh, no. Tristan _hadn't_ …

"Haven't you met these guys before?" Duke waved his free hand in his two students' general direction, the other still firmly clamped over his eyes. "Real American Heroes. Practically action figures." His lips thinned from the teasing curve they'd fallen into. "You couldn't hurry those pain meds up a little…?"

The nurse _had_ brought Duke's medication, and handed the two small pills to him along with his water. He downed both, and lay back with a soft sigh, eyes closed. She picked up a rectangle of blue paper – like an oversized bandage – from the tray beside Duke's bed, and peeled the backing off. Before her patient could see to argue, she smoothed the hair back from his forehead and plastered the blue bandage against his skin. There was still white paper backing attached to the front part, and seeing this, Joey giggled. Duke looked like he had a note card stuck to his face.

"What the—?" Duke protested, and then felt the gel in the 'bandage' rapidly cooling. He'd seen something in a commercial about this. Migraine pads, or something. Below the funny-looking gel pad, green eyes gazed up at the nurse, bright with relief and gratitude. "Thanks."

The nurse smiled in return. "The pain medication should start to work in about twenty minutes," she reassured, as Duke closed his eyes once more with a sigh, "We'll keep you here until your temperature goes down, and then you can go. We called your house and left a message. They said that your father might be home."

"He doesn't answer the phone much."

"Is there anyone else you'd like us to call?"

"I'm sure Tristan can get me home," Duke replied lightly, and Tristan cringed, understanding that he'd just been handed a _very_ rare reprieve.

The nurse, satisfied, left the three boys alone with stern orders for Duke to drink as much of the nearby jug of water as he could. Because of the heat, the hospital's reserves of electrolytes were exhausted. Duke was rather grateful for that – he'd had it before and it tasted awful.

"So," Duke drew out the single syllable in the relative quiet after the nurse had gone, "I hear I should be pretty lucky."

"I wouldn't've driven it if I hadn't been so damn wo—!" Tristan protested frantically. Duke cut him off.

"It's not a big deal."

"…It's not?"

Duke tried very hard not to smile at the audible relief in the brunet's voice. "No, it's not. I expect you to wash and wax it though, since you _did_ drive it without my permission…"

Tristan groaned. He knew there had to be a catch. And that was a _lot_ of car.

"…but the fact is, I am pretty lucky. Thanks for…uh…"

"Coming to your rescue," Joey grinned.

"It's _your_ fault I was in that studio in the first place, don't forget," Duke reminded. Joey rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly, then remembered the 'note card' still stuck to the older boy's forehead and forgot all about being embarrassed.

"That damn studio is like an oven," Tristan complained, "we've gotta find somewhere else to practice. I dunno how Téa can stand it up there."

"Like your basement?" Joey suggested innocently.

Tristan jerked his head up. Joey flushed. "I didn't mean—" He blurted. Tristan elbowed him and he fell silent.

Duke never replied. He kept his eyes closed, breathing slowly in, slowly out, waiting for the medication to kick in so he could think without risking his forehead splitting open. Felt himself slowly turning to lead underneath the blue gel cooling pad. His arms were too heavy to move, but he wanted a drink so badly… the cold smell of the pad on his forehead was making him sick to his stomach…

Gradually, even the dull roar of people beyond the dividing curtain became too quiet. Tristan started to fidget. Joey, choked by the underlying tension in the small space, nudged the taller boy at his side. "I'm hungry."

Tristan gave a short laugh. "You always are."

"Naw, it's _late_ , and we didn't get any lunch except for those crappy Twix bars outta the machine."

"Hey, those weren't crappy."

"Guys—" Duke admonished, moved and slightly embarrassed with them for missing a meal on his account.

"Sure, we could've just left you on the floor while we went to McDonald's," Tristan's grin was sarcastic. Joey whined urgently in his throat at the mention of the fast food restaurant.

"Don't talk about _food_ unless you're gonna _feed_ me."

"I don't know where the cafeteria is. You'll probably die of starvation before I—"

"Take the elevator to the basement; first big set of glass double doors in front of ya to your right," Joey reeled off the directions by rote, "Got a _big_ sign over 'em says "Ca-feh-TEER-ee-uh. Ya can't miss it." Joey glanced at the other two boys, who exchanged knowing smiles. He pulled a face. "What? Like I had anything _else_ to do while we were waitin' for you t'come around? Go get me a hot dog, Tris." He gave Tristan's side another push for good measure. Tristan groaned good-naturedly and left in search of the elevator.

The conversation lulled while the footsteps receded into the cacophony outside the curtain.

"Hungry? Convenient to carry an all-purpose diversion like your stomach," Duke said in an approving tone.

Joey shrugged. "I really am hungry. But yeah…be better if he's gone a while anyway. He'd just start yellin' at me and nothin'd get done."

"You've forgotten that I have mild heat exhaustion? What are you planning to get done?"

The pain medication seemed to be working. The gel pad attached to Duke's forehead was frigid now, numbing his skin and – from the feel of it – all activity in the frontal lobe of his brain. He still hated the smell, but it was livable. His skull no longer felt a size too small. When Joey continued to hesitate, Duke made an executive decision that he was too tired, too sick and too thirsty to stress over any emotional backlash that the other boy's next words might bring.

He'd already decided he couldn't handle it. Might as well completely throw in the towel and decide he didn't care.

"Look," Joey started slowly, "I know I'm s'posed to take it easy on ya 'cause you're sick..."

"I passed out. I'm not dying," Duke protested. Joey went on as though he hadn't heard.

"But I figure, you being antsy-ass as you are, this is probably the best chance I got of makin' ya listen."

"Joey?" Duke asked, goading the other boy with his voice. For a horrified moment, he wondered if Tristan and Joey's relationship was already in trouble. They weren't going to ask him for _advice_ , were they? He couldn't handle that. He could _not_ deal with playing marriage counselor to—

"How d'you feel about 'em?"

Joey's voice cut across his thoughts like an air horn. Duke's mind abruptly stopped its hamster-circles of panic, before spinning and scrabbling in a completely _new_ kind of panic. "About _what_?" He demanded, hoping he hadn't heard right.

"About Tristan."

Oh. He'd heard it right.

So much for that executive decision. Duke's muscles tightened. His temples pulsed, and he reached up to rub them. "Why're you asking?"

"Well, I—" Joey didn't know where to begin, struggling now that he was on the receiving end of the questions, "all I know s'that he's a different guy when you're around. An' he gets all protective and funny kinda nervous. An' he told me about the night you guys went up to the mill."

Duke gritted his teeth. Jesus, he'd told _Joey_? Next thing he knew, there'd be a sympathy card from _Yugi_ in the mail. "What does _that_ have to do with anything?" His voice, miraculously, remained level.

"Well, nothing, but—" Joey held his focus out of an urgent need to finish his thought, "—'Cept that Tristan got awful confused an' I want to set things right."

 _So do I,_ Duke sighed, wishing deeply that he'd never leaned toward Tristan in the first place.

'Yeah, right,' his subconscious retorted. The voice that belonged to the person who never regretted leaning forward. The person whose only regret was not following. Not that it would have mattered.

Expectant eyes were on him still, shaking him out of his thoughts. Joey waited for him to say something. Duke felt his stare, felt the electric intensity of the silence, and knew how hard he was trying. Whatever it was that bothered the blond boy so much, he was doing the best he knew how to fix the problem.

"Nothing is wrong," Duke reassured with unexpected gentleness. "If Tristan is confused, let him talk to me. Look, don't worry about it…Joey, my head hurts, so could you please—?"

"He ain't ever gonna know I asked!" Joey snapped impatiently.

"…Why not?"

"'Cause he likes you but he's afraid you're straight but I say I'm practically the poster boy for changing my mind, but then he says he scared you off an' you think he's some kinda psycho an' I just don't—"

"Tristan _likes_ me?" Duke cut off the ramble, sifting through the incoherencies for a clear thought. He found it, and found himself staring incredulously at the golden face hanging over his. Movement flickered at the edge of his vision, and his gaze slid sideways to catch an older man shuffling away from the curtain, shaking his head hard. "You're kidding," he went on in a lower tone.

"Yeah, you asshole, and you sure are doing a shitty job of showing it if ya like him back!"

"But—Joey, I thought you and he—you—"

Joey's eager determination abruptly deflated at the recollection. He knew Tristan cared about Duke. But…

But nothing. His shoulders drew back, strengthening his will.

"I don't worry about me. You shoulda seen the way he was with you—all but carried ya outside by himself and stood over you like some kinda guard dog. Had the fan on you and kept one of those water bottles on your forehead 'til we figured out what to do."

"He'd do that for you, and you know it."

"Yeah, maybe, but…"

"Leave it alone, Joey. Or are you already wanting to push him off on someone else? That was quick." Eyebrow arch.

"No! I just want 'em to be _happy_ , dammit!"

Duke winced. Joey winced in chagrin and sympathy. "Sorry."

"He's happy."

"I'unno," Joey replied dubiously.

"No, believe me. This morning I could tell."

Joey shrugged, abashed, unfolded his hands and wiped them on his pants.

"You don't think it'll last," Duke observed.

"Nah, it ain't that, so much. Tris an' me, we're for keeps."

"Awfully confident of you."

"Well, 'cause it's true. With us it don't matter what we are. If this doesn't work out, well then, we'll just go back to bein' best friends an'—"

"You really believe that?" Duke's reply was incredulous. Would it hurt Joey to find out that he had a long list of examples indicating otherwise?

"I know it," Joey responded loyally.

"Then where's the trouble here?"

"Likin' somebody don't always make you happy. Sometimes it'll make ya damn miserable."

"Liking Tristan's making you miserable?"

"No, dammit, nothin' like that!" Joey's hands slashed emphatically at the thought. "I'm afraid him likin' _me_ is gonna make _him_ miserable."

"And I can fix that problem…how…?"

"Well, Tristan likes ya, I can tell, an'—" Joey trailed off.

Duke's eyebrows raced one another to bury themselves in his hairline. "…And?"

Joey continued to look at him steadily, intently, before dropping his eyes. He had a really attractive colour when those wind burned cheeks flushed.

"You can't be serious!" Duke sat upright, and doubled over in pain. He covered his eyes, took in a strained breath. "Joey, I don't know what you're getting at exactly, but I refuse to get in the middle of your relationship with Tristan."

"Why not?" Joey challenged, indignant, "So we're not good enough for ya? You're already in this up to your friggin' _hips_ , man! We wouldn't even _be_ doin' all this if it wasn't for you!"

We?

… _We?_

"I don't ever remember telling you that I wasn't straight," Duke's voice was faint. He swallowed rapidly.

There was a pause after that. "So…you are straight?" Joey asked fearfully.

Duke curled his free arm around one knee, draped by the crisp hospital sheet. "I never said that," he replied soberly. It was simpler to admit with his hand over his eyes. "I just don't remember telling you."

Joey's victorious grin went unnoticed. "I figured it out myself," he reported, and shrugged, "C'mon, it was pretty easy once I started wondering if all the 'ladies' man' shit was an act."

The silence stretched out after this revelation until Joey began fidgeting. "Didn't mean anything _bad_ …" he started, interrupted by a soft chuckle from the bed.

"Yeah, I guess it would be kind of obvious once you knew that," Duke laughed.

"What I said earlier—" Joey began again, doggedly. "—all your fault, man. That morning we caught you dancing…we kinda…"

"I guess I knew," Duke shook his head. He drew in a slow, calming breath and dropped his fingertips to his temples. "You aren't the most subtle two people I've ever met." Another pause. "So I assume that since you blame me, you want me to—what? Talk to him for you and see if he's okay with this, since he likes me?" _Why am I doing this?_ Duke sighed inwardly, "Not that I couldn't wile the information out of him, but I just don't think that's a good idea…"

Joey tucked his chin, dropping his eyes like a little boy with a secret. Not the good kind, either, judging from his expression. "Kinda…"

"… 'Kinda'?" Duke repeated. His eyebrows rose.

Joey shrugged. "Look, other people do it an' it works for them, an' you hear about it all the time so it must be _something_ …he already likes you an' I think you're—" His words staggered off clumsily, casting about for an appropriate word, "—cute too, I guess."

" _Cute_?" Duke repeated dubiously. He realized he was echoing Joey's words and grimaced, and dropped suddenly restless hands on the bed. The headache was manageable, his temperature had to have dropped by now and if he was going to get another glass of water, he'd do it at home. Away from Joey. Because Joey obviously wasn't sane. "I think maybe you got a little overheated too."

Joey grunted, upper body going limp over the edge of the bed's metal railing. " _Not_ crazy," he complained.

"I'm not the one hitting on me, now, am I?"

" _Not_ hitting on you, goddammit!"

"No, you just think I'm 'cute,'" Duke retorted, mocking, "and you had the _overwhelming_ urge to tell me." _Make it stop. Just somebody…make it stop._

 

* * *

 

Joey's focus crumbled. There was no way to work around it delicately, no way to make the offer sound any kind of decent. Watching Tristan with Duke when he'd been on the floor, getting to hold onto the incapacitated boy in the backseat of his car on the way to the hospital…all the little things and the good times when Duke _wasn't_ trying to taunt Joey into going for his throat…

It hadn't sounded like such a bad idea in the car on the way over to the hospital. Now, it just sounded stupid, greedy and impossible. Sounded indecent. Seeing that happen to what had been a good idea made him angry. "You don't stick around unless you got a reason!" Joey cried, "Why the hell're you fighting me so hard? Don't ya want—?"

"Want _you_?"

The two syllables were pure ice, frigid, hard and cutting. Duke had pulled up every ounce of disdain, and the shocked, disappointed expression in those green eyes was unbearable. Duke thought he wanted to cheat on Tristan. _Leave_ Tristan. Hurt the poor guy… _hurt_ Tristan? That made no sense, this whole conversation had taken a turn completely away from his original intention, and Duke was implying that he'd _want_ to _hurt Tristan_ … "Want _Tristan_ , you asshole!" Joey yelped, shoving blond bangs out of his eyes with one hand to glare furiously at his bedridden companion, "God knows it can't be me, considerin' ya _pick_ on me all the fucking time! An' everything's lookin' that way, but he's pretty damn hardheaded an' for some screwed-up reason he's after _my_ ass instead of yours!"

The gaze locked on his was no longer hard green glass. Duke's expression was the picture of comic shock.

Joey's lips twisted into a masochistic smirk. "Good. 'Least I got your attention now. Anyway…I _had_ an idea t'fix it, but I'm guessin' it's not gonna work 'cause you're so goddamn _moral_ all of a sudden…"

Duke bristled, but Joey ignored it in lieu of getting the subject back on track. He'd probably already ruined everything, but if there was a tiny, _tiny_ chance…

Yugi taught him not to give up until all his points were cashed in.

And even then, that's why God made rematches.

"…I wanna share."

* * *

 _I cannot be hearing this. He's crazy. Heat exhaustion,_ has _to be. He's going to pass out any second with a hundred-degree fever and not remember any of this._

Duke stared hard at Joey, eyes narrowing, trying to see through the sudden, unanticipated stranger before him. "You're insane," he said at last, slowly.

Joey glared at him briefly, before all the heat went out of the amber-brown eyes and left the desperation behind, and his head dropped onto his forearms, blond hair tousling across his elbows.

"Fuck," Joey cursed softly against his own skin. And then again. " _Fuck_."

"It's not possible," Duke muttered, "even if it _was_ , it'd kill us. All three of us. Whenever Tristan was with _me_ , you'd get jealous…"

"Would not," was the muffled reply from within the nest of Joey's arms.

"…and when he was with _you_ , I'd be _insanely_ jealous."

Joey snorted. "You're not now, are you?" he challenged.

"That's _different_ , Joey! I'm not _with_ either of you!"

"Then what if we _all_ shared?" There was still hope in Joey's eyes, in spite of everything. No matter how impossible it was.

Duke still hadn't told him no.

Looking down at him now, he found that he couldn't.

Perhaps some of Joey's insanity had crossed the space between them. Maybe he simply couldn't resist the siren call – Joey was offering to him the very things he'd wanted so much, and thought had been taken away from him this morning.

Reality crushed down firmly on the tiny, delicate tendrils of possibility. Harsh reality – when it failed, it would destroy not only his growing friendship with both of them…but it would destroy the great friendship. Joey and Tristan might never speak to one another again. It would never work, and it shouldn't. It never had before.

"You couldn't handle me," Duke said, sarcastic, hoping to discourage him.

A rising flush colored Joey's neck and cheeks, crept down the bare white arms slipping out of Tristan's basketball jersey. "What's _that_ supposed t'mean?" he growled.

"I'm high-maintenance. I talk too much and I'm sarcastic as all hell. I know how to manipulate people." _Albeit I've done a shoddy job of it lately…_ "I'm too much for you to handle. You know that. I can get under your skin and piss you off enough to want to shake me. I've done it before." In his turmoil, Duke had forgotten about his headache. He reached for his water glass, eyes slitted as he regarded Joey over the rim. "Does that sound healthy to you?" He took a sip.

"Aw, Tristan an' I wanna beat on each other all the time—"

The mouthful of water went down a little rougher than usual. "That's called abuse."

"It's not like we actually _do_ it!" Joey retorted indignantly. "Don't ya know an exaggeration when ya hear one?"

"Don't you know when to give up?" Duke asked, and pushed himself up, moving for the opposite edge of the bed near the monitors, where the guardrails were down. Hopefully Tristan or the nurse or both would get here soon and he'd be able to go home. When he got there he was going to lock himself in his room for the next month. Where it was air conditioned and cool. With strawberries and a nice, isolated bed where he could hibernate…

Those comforts – distant as they were and as much as he longed for them – became torture, and his chest knotted inside. He had listened to Joey's suddenly lunatic ravings with the patience of a saint. Nobody would think any less of him for his weakness. He couldn't be blamed for bolting...

"Do I know when to give up? I sure do," Joey said decisively, and reached out to catch his hand. The nurses had stripped him of his rings, along with his earrings and necklace, and so he felt the full, damp, overheated press of Joey's fingers meshing with his. "…Not time yet."

Murder was quickly becoming justifiable, and very tempting. Duke turned in the direction of the pull, missing the other hand flashing toward his opposite shoulder as he lashed out.

" _What_ do you—mmf!" His hiss turned into a surprised, muffled yelp. Clumsy lips fastened onto his, as apparently Joey had taken Duke's earlier challenge seriously and decided to prove that he _could_ handle the older boy. Or at least that he was willing.

Those lips got a little less clumsy while Duke was thinking. He struggled to get away, but he was at a bad angle, lower half facing mostly away from Joey and sitting on his hip. The hand on his shoulder and the other holding his fingers prisoner was restraint enough. Gave him enough time to really register the feeling, and what it meant, and _who_ was doing it to him. His skin – chilly in the cool emergency room – blazed now with heat. He made a last token effort to get away, but the person who'd given in to his conscience with Tristan was not about to do the same now with Joey.

Joey leaned further across the railing when Duke tried to turn his face away. His mouth grew gentler, less fierce and simply more…insistent. They were both off balance. If one pulled away, the other would probably fall.

Giving in to Joey's will, giving in to his own, Duke closed his eyes.

Joey released him gradually as his body relaxed. The kisses continued, lengthened. Longish blond hairs tickled the older boy's cheek. Tentative touches, but deliberate. Duke found his lower lip drawn between Joey's and sucked on, a little, and it made him shiver. The panic and the pain and the denial so hard and sharp-edged that it hurt washed out of the way, if only for the span of a few seconds.

A span of seconds was long enough.

Just inside the curtain, an open bottle of soda hit the tile floor and frothed a splatter of caramel foam. Both boys snapped back from one another at the noisy pop like they'd been stung.

They turned as a single unit, eyes fixing in horror on the face of the person who'd caught them.

"…Hey," Tristan said, drawing the word into two syllables, hitching up the last.

Ignoring the bottle on the floor, the brunet boy flashed them a smile—how could a smile be such an awful thing?—and placed a brown paper bag of hospital food gently on the end of the bed.

That task done, he stepped back over the sticky, slippery mess on the floor, and bolted around the dividing curtain in two steps.

Joey plunged after him.

Duke ripped the pulse monitor off of his hand. He struggled to get off of the bed and follow them, but he was slow, shirtless and barefoot, and could only watch them disappear down the corridor with a sinking stomach.

He turned back in desperation. Saw his boots and his shirt neatly folded on a nearby chair, topped with his wallet. He pounced on them.

* * *

"Tristan! STOP! Goddammit, WAIT UP!"

Tristan had longer legs and a very strong desire to run. The brunet barely evaded Joey all the way to the parking lot. The air was sizzling and the pavement threw rippling shimmers of heat. Sweat beaded Joey's skin immediately, like condensation on a glass, and a wet wind stirred up to blow his bangs across his vision. He'd nearly been run down once, which only gave Tristan a bigger head start to the car. Determined to catch him – _hoping_ he caught him before Tristan managed to change his mind and vanish completely – Joey tightened his fists and lengthened his stride.

He found the bigger boy collapsed across the door panel of the convertible, sobbing for air. Just in the tiny span of time they'd been outside, both boys were soaking. Joey cast himself against the opposite door and panted.

"Leave me alone," Tristan gasped, "get…just…just get, okay?" The last word was strained and high. He was begging.

"Why'd you…why…?" Joey asked brokenly, adrenaline still flooding his system, the soles of his shoes already hot from the pavement. If Tristan ran again, he'd catch him this time.

" _Leave_."

"No! I'm not gonna leave ya this time!"

Tristan jerked his head up from his dull study of the blazing white upholstery. He looked for a moment as though he might laugh, but the expression twisted, and he pushed away from the door. " _Fine_."

Joey started to worry when Tristan stalked toward him, circling the trunk of the car. He'd seen that look before. He'd seen it on Tristan's face during some the occasions he'd like most to forget.

Tristan wanted to hit something.

Hard. Over and over.

Instinct took over and fresh adrenaline surged. Joey started to back up, fists doubling over again. He didn't want to beat on Tristan, but he _damn_ sure didn't want to get his own gut pummeled.

The other boy turned at the driver's side and dug in his pocket. He leaned over the door. Joey watched him plunge the key into the ignition and step back.

Then he was gone.

Joey slumped against the fender and didn't watch him go.


	16. Chapter 16

The figure on the edge of the parking lot wavered like a desert heat mirage. Duke caught sight of him coming back in, brilliant white and blue-edged in Tristan's basketball jersey, brown arms and shoulders and collarbones and long throat slipping out of it. He was running, flat out, starting to deflate from the heat but still moving rapidly towards the massive glass double doors.

He started yelling for Duke before he got inside, his mouth a round, comical pantomime that burst with sound as the first set of doors thrust inward to let him pass. People skittered out of the way. Nurses at the central station of the ward only gave him a cursory glance. They saw his kind of crazy every day.

Joey slammed to a halt prior to reaching the second set of doors, as his gaze settled on Duke. His next bellow could be heard through the glass.

"DUKE!"

Giving in to momentary panic, remembering the bright white light bouncing off of Tristan's motorcycle helmet, Duke loped across the open floor to meet him. The door opened again as he dashed through, exhaling a breath of hot, clammy air over his skin. He remembered his earlier misery, felt the phantom pulse of a headache at the edges of the painkillers, and gritted his teeth.

Joey, meanwhile, was in full cry. "GODDAMMIT, he got away! Gotta go af—!" He bit off the last sentence when an arm came across his chest, halting any further movement forward. He grabbed at it, frantic. "What the hell? Let go of me!"

"Calm down, Joey," Duke replied, voice low and tired, "I'm right _here_."

They stood in the entrance, between the two sets of automatic glass doors. Hot and cold air blasted them intermittently. Gradually, as Joey's sanity returned and his mind functioned over the adrenaline surge, he released his wild grip on Duke's arm. "He left," Exhaustion overcame him at last and his frame slumped.

He was on the edge of losing it completely. Duke saw it. With speed and finesse that seemed instinctive, he shut out the distractions, shut out Joey's emotional instability and his own rising panic, and like water the logical thoughts flowed in, one after another.

"Joey," his voice was calm. He blinked slowly, and swallowed, tasting bitter adrenaline on the back of his tongue.

"Huh?" Joey's voice broke mid-syllable. Nevertheless, his focus was on Duke now.

"Joey, did he take the car?"

The blond boy - not having the skills of self-collection that his companion did – stared at Duke without comprehension for a moment. Then he remembered, and his expression brightened with relief. The idea of Tristan handling a car that wasn't his was a foreign thought and didn't make the slightest bit of logical sense. Earlier situation exempt, of course. "No…?"

"Are you _sure_?"

"Yeah I'm sure!" Joey retorted indignantly, shuffling to the side when an elderly woman's walker bumped against him. He looked around, bewildered, as though realizing for the first time where he was. The wounded-animal panic was flickering in his eyes again when Duke called his attention back.

With the sudden surge of activity came the ache again. Duke's eyes fell partly closed, and he swallowed. "Did he take the keys?"

"No…" Joey patted his pants pocket, felt the bulge there and heard the metallic rattle. He dug the keys out and handed them over. "He's so pissed an' I wouldn't blame 'em and…"

Duke brushed past him, keys disappearing in his pocket. Joey stared after him for a heartbeat, still trying to think clearly, when Duke's fingers wrapped around his upper arm and yanked him into motion alongside.

"We'll find him," Duke replied, reassuringly, and led the way back to the car.

They didn't, as it turned out. Or at least not the way they'd expected to find him.

Joey tried to call Tristan's cell phone, then his home phone. The former only reached his voicemail; the latter a busy signal.

The boys continued to search for him, carefully sticking to the topic at hand or saying nothing at all. He must have walked to Téa's place, or taken the subway from the downtown district to this one (which was more likely) and returned home with his motorcycle. Said motorcycle was parked in the shade of the Taylor garage, while Duke's cell phone registered a busy signal once again as they passed by.

"Phone off the hook," Duke predicted with a sigh.

Joey slumped back in his seat, hanging up. "Or Yugi called him 'cause he knew somehow. He's like that." He snapped the case shut and flipped the phone onto the seat. The convertible eased over towards the curb across the street and a few houses down. "What are you doing?"

"Going in," Duke explained, shoving the gearshift into park. He turned off the engine.

"You kidding?" Joey exclaimed and snatched Duke's elbow before he could get out of the car.

"Why?" Duke demanded and stared, gaze starting on his hand and working its way up his forearm to fix on Joey's face. They pulled apart. "Why not just talk to him? You know, like normal people generally _do_ when they have a misunderstanding? The way normal people should _do_ before they go and do something that could be taken the wrong way?"

Joey flushed with anger and embarrassment. "You don't _corner_ the guy when he's mad!"

"What's your problem? Why are you so worried? I'm not going to corner him," Duke countered, trying once again to get out of the car, "I just want to tell him what happened."

"Then I'll do it."

Joey's reply was firm, resolute, and focused. Surprised, the older boy turned back. He knew there was more coming, and so he waited, door slightly ajar, one heel on the pavement and one hand on the steering wheel, prepared to push himself up.

"This is my fault," Joey went on, "I'll handle it." He got out of his side of the car, and frowned when he saw Duke doing the same. "What're you doing?" Joey asked again.

"Going with you," Duke replied, punctuating it with a car door's slam. With a sigh of defeat, Joey followed him down the street to the Taylors' front door.

An extremely pregnant Erin answered the door. She wore an old blue tee shirt knotted just below her breasts, exposing the soft, prominent roundness of her stomach. Her hair was pulled back in a clip. Loose tendrils of sweaty hair clung to her cheeks. "Hello?" She asked, noticing Duke first, as people generally did.

Duke blinked down at her in surprise. A pregnant woman? Too young to be Tristan's mother... "Are you—?"

Joey stepped around him before he could embarrass himself. "S'Tristan home?" He asked, bluntly. When Duke threw him a glare, Joey looped his arm around Duke's shoulders. He smiled beatifically on the woman at the door.

Tristan's gesture.

Duke was rendered perfectly speechless.

Erin stared at them both, expression sobered. She lifted one hand to push the bangs away from her face. "Barged in here a couple of minutes ago. Looked sort of—did something happen? Is everything okay?"

"Kind of," Joey admitted sheepishly, "I need to talk to him. Think that'd be okay?"

"Does he know you were coming?" Suddenly Erin seemed to fill up more of the doorway; a protective human barricade. Joey caught the nonverbal demand. _Does he_ want _you here?_

She was looking at him funny, and he didn't like it. And trying to act like he wasn't the reason for Tristan's stormy temper was like trying _not_ to act guilty even when the broken lamp wasn't your fault.

Of course, the broken lamp really _was_ his fault, this time.

"It's really important. C'mon, Erin, please?" Joey wheedled. "Just a couple of minutes. S'he downstairs?"

Erin looked at him very hard for a moment or two. She had her brother's eyes, and the same piercing, judging stare, and it was difficult for the boys to avoid squirming. Finally, she moved out of the way. "He's downstairs. Been down there since he got home. Careful, smells like paint fumes even with the doors open down there."

"Is that good for the little guy?" Joey asked, letting go of Duke's shoulder and patting Erin's stomach on the way by. Duke said nothing but attempted to smile. He felt outside of his territory here; uncomfortable despite his exceptional people skills. The woman must be Tristan's sister, he surmised, watching the interaction between Erin and Joey.

He stood on the outside of this circle. The pessimist in him concluded that it was just one more sign.

"No, probably not," Erin sighed. She relaxed as Joey became the boy she knew and not the possible threat to her brother's peace of mind. "The central air is out, so it's even more miserable. Mom's offered to take us out to dinner so we can get away from the smell."

Duke shifted, drawing Erin's attention with the movement. She blinked in surprise, as though noticing him for the very first time. "Have we met?" She asked. Hazel eyes narrowed as she reached after a half-remembered name.

The little crease between her eyebrows and the slight purse of her lips seemed so much like Tristan that Duke found himself genuinely smiling.

"Duke Devlin," He offered helpfully.

His wounded dignity eased a little at the way Erin's eyes widened when name and reputation linked with his face in her memory. _Still got it_. Dancing around the pair of jokers he'd been stuck with for the last few weeks had been starting to wear on his ego a little. Erin reached over her stomach to shake his hand, and they both laughed over this, and then she left him alone.

Joey was quite a distance ahead of him, too focused on his goal to wait. Duke had been to this house many times, however, and found the basement stairs on his own. The hallway descending into the lower level was dark in the middle and smelled thickly of paint fumes with an undertone of oil. He could dimly see photographs on the walls. A dozen faces peeped blankly through many round holes cut in the same matte.

As he reached the bottom and the glow of light reaching around the corner, Duke expected to hear raised voices.

There was only Joey.

"I didn't mean it," Joey was saying weakly. He sounded far away. Duke stopped short of the corner. The words hadn't _hurt_ , precisely, but they had a mild, surprising sting.

In response, footsteps shuffled and paused. Tristan did not reply. Duke pressed flat against the dividing wall and leaned out, palms braced against the cool wood slats of the wainscoting.

The basement was mostly dark past the landing, save for the glow of the shop beyond the usual piles of junk. The dark vignetted the far end of the room, where Tristan bent over a motorcycle fender clamped to a fiberboard counter. Joey stood behind him and to one side, leaning against the opposite counter, half-obscured by a support column. Duke heard the faint hiss of pressurized air. The fumes hedged on unbearable, and he breathed through his mouth to avoid the smell. The chemical scent lay heavy and almost choking in the back of his throat.

"I didn't mean it the way you think I did, anyway," Joey went on.

The airbrush went swish, and swish.

"Aren't y'gonna say anything?"

Swish. Tristan circled the island countertop where the fender was clamped and started in on the stencil from another angle.

"D'you know how fucking _annoying_ you are when you pull this?" Joey's tone laced with irritation now. He hadn't looked up yet. It was easy to assume that he'd already forgotten about Duke.

The airbrush touched down on the countertop with a solid clack. "It's okay, Joey."

"Huh?" Joey moved closer to Tristan now in little increments, touching his fingertips to the counter as he finally came into view. He seemed unnaturally still.

Duke slid around the corner completely and moved toward them, picking his way along the path cleared amid the dark lumps of boxes and bike parts. He stopped just short of coming into the light.

"It's not a big deal," Tristan went on, leaning against the island with his back to his unknown watcher. His shoulders rolled tight under his tank top as he pulled off his gloves and laid them slowly down. "I guess I'm just surprised."

"Well _damn_ man, that makes two of us," Joey laughed, nervously. A look from Tristan silenced him, and he turned away.

"I don't even—" Tristan's voice had a crack to it as soon as he started, and he choked off, shaking his head hard. "I don't know what to do. D'you? I'm not supposed to be pissed off at you."

"But I—" Joey's brow furrowed in confusion, then smoothed with understanding. "I never figured we'd be doing this either. Weird, huh?"

"Look, if that's—if he's—what you want…" Tristan trailed off, and his body visibly deflated. He rubbed the back of his neck furiously as though saying the words was incredibly embarrassing. Joey, on the other hand, finally remembered that he'd left a friend of his upstairs, and his gaze shot into the dark, searching past the dazzle of the work lamps for a sign of Duke.

Not knowing why he did it, Duke ducked instinctively out of sight before Joey could spot him. Interrupting them now would only make things worse.

His own reaction surprised him. At any other time, with any other people, he would have made himself as conspicuous as possible. None of this was his fault, he reminded himself curtly. If Joey didn't have things sorted out soon, then he _would_ take matters into his own hands.

"Geez, don't you get it? I wasn't _doing_ it for me!"

Silence again, though incredulous this time rather than sullen. Seeing his opportunity slipping away, Joey dove after it. "I _know_ you like Duke, you dumbass! Dude, _who_ was making out with 'em at the pond?" He stumbled on, ignoring the other boy's surprised and angry protest. "But for some reason you're so damn stuck on me that you ain't never gonna see—and I didn't wanna hurt you—dammit Tristan, I'd _never_ do that!"

He was losing it, panicking. Duke winced, and pushed away from the support column that had been his haven.

"It was my fault."

Duke moved past the fuzzy edge of the light, and the other boys stared at him. "It was—a game. To see which one of you I could… but it got out of hand. Everything was my fault." He pushed his hands into his pockets, elbows loose, and shrugged. A tiny smile appeared. The kind that Tristan usually got when he was putting himself down. "I like you both. Was it a crime to want both of you?"

Neither boy answered.

Duke turned to go. He stumbled over something in the dark and cursed. Tristan and Joey broke from their hypnotized state to help him. He threw them off and rushed up the stairs like an embarrassed cat, leaving the others staring awkwardly after him. He made it halfway – far enough for the heat and humidity to smack him in the face again – before he turned around. By then they had already turned inward again and forgotten to listen.

When his footsteps stilled, he heard rough, broken sobs coming from the shop. He turned around and sat down, arms folded across one another in his lap. He felt a strange sense of homelessness – a helpless detachment from everything. Lost? Yes. He felt lost.

Duke listened to the cries until they quieted, and then got up to go.

In the basement, on a concrete floor that had held them not so very long ago, Joey and Tristan curled in on one another.

* * *

Air conditioners all over Domino whined on high as Duke drove away from the Taylor house. He rode with the convertible top down, letting himself be angry at the chunks of hair that whipped into his mouth. The headache was slowly surfacing again, but in a different spot. He couldn't be sure if it was because of his earlier spell or because of the sudden oppressive change in the weather. The air pressure was rapidly rising, the radio station meteorologist explained, because a cold front was moving down from Canada. By the Monday after next, temperatures should have dropped at least ten degrees if not more. Chance of storms all of the following week, likeliest next weekend. Pickups at rock bottom prices available from the friendly local used auto sales. Estate auction on next Friday afternoon. Craft store advertising next month's Christmas In July sale. By the time the station returned to music, he was home.

 

He pulled into the rear parking lot of his game shop and was out of the car and toward the door before the sweat could start condensing on his forehead. He hurried with a sudden absolute loathing for the heat, despising the still air and how tired it made him feel. Duke pushed the back door in and breathed a sigh of relief when an icy blast from within dried the moisture dotting his upper lip. At least _his_ central air was still functioning.

The hall upstairs was dark and barren – of all the places in the building, only Duke's suite looked as though someone actually _lived_ there. The living room and the kitchen were beige and faceless. Every drop of extra money went into the shop to keep it alive. Duke climbed the stairs and unlocked the door to the flat, looking left as was his habit to squint at the LED display on the microwave above the stove.

It no longer blinked – Duke at least had taken the time to fix that – and read "10:30." In an hour and a half it would be Saturday, Duke realized with a snap. He'd been out too late. Tomorrow morning would be hell, as all the restocking needed to be done before they could open and he hadn't done it tonight.

Great. Even more reason to be depressed.

Keys clattered onto his desk when Duke reached the safe, cool haven of his room. Not pausing in his restless motion, he crossed his arms over his stomach, snatched double handfuls of his tanktop and yanked it over his head. When had he gotten that on this afternoon? When he'd passed out, as far as Duke knew, he was still without a shirt.

Duke's knuckles brushed his own ribs on their way down to pop open the clasp of his pants, and he shivered involuntarily, the touch coinciding with the thought of Tristan dressing him earlier that day. A cold shower was in order, Duke decided.

He kicked off his boots and walked naked to his own bathroom. The air flowed smooth and cool over his bare skin and the carpet of his bedroom plushed under his feet as though apologizing for all of the day's discomfort.

In the shower, with the white hiss of water all around and the stark reality of cold freezing raw nerve endings, Duke felt more awake than he had all afternoon. The water did nothing for his headache, but he could handle that later.

The burst of energy was shortlived. After a little while, the chill soaked through and his fingers and toes went numb. His insides and his thighs began to shiver like he'd been swimming for hours before. Weakness and fatigue followed. Before he understood it, Duke's frame was shaking and he had to lean against the wall. His forearm touched the front wall of the shower under the head, pressed, and he leaned into it. He let his forehead fall against the warm bar of flesh braced against the shower wall, and stared at the faucet below. Icy rivulets of water crawled over his shoulders and slid down his chest.

Duke noted impassively that his breaths had shortened until his chest pushed roughly in and out with the effort. He closed his eyes and tried to halt the shivering. In response, his body only felt even more strained and tense, and the bottled-up bits of him spilled out as he was forced to acknowledge that yes, something _was_ happening to him.

He didn't cry. That had been taken out of him a long time ago. Captive to his father's goals for so long as a weapon honed and prepared for war, Duke learned to set his feelings at one remove when things started to hurt. The purpose was more important than the loss of his mother. The goal meant more than the pain that his father wanted him only to have revenge.

It worked when he needed to think over the panic at Tristan's disappearance. It worked when he needed to escape the younger boy's rejection. It worked when Joey's muddy thought processes almost ripped Tristan's heart out.

Tonight it wasn't working. Maybe too many uses in a week wore it out. Duke collapsed against the wall and let the first barrier down as his ragged breath hitched up sharply for a sniffle. That barrier led to another, and another, until everything came crashing down and the anger and embarrassment and loss hit with full force.

Self-pity wasn't his thing, and he didn't wallow in it other than a twinge of 'shouldn't-have-done-that' shame. What he _did_ feel was awful for the trouble he'd caused. It wasn't a feeling he was used to. Maybe he wasn't entirely responsible for everything that went wrong in the past week, but he had been the catalyst. Joey and Tristan might still just be happily mauling one another in innocence without his intervention.

But they _weren't_ innocent.

None of them were. The horrors they faced as a group robbed them of every last shred of innocence. Somehow the other boys maintained their sparkle in spite of it. Was that why he loved them?

_What?_

Duke's head jerked away from the wall, and with an inarticulate moan sagged back down. If he didn't like needless suffering, he was doing a bang-up job of pulling it off.

Another hour and a half passed before he finished with the shower. By then it was Saturday.

Going to bed with wet hair wasn't an option. He _never_ went to bed with wet hair. Thus, Duke sat crosslegged on his bed with the hairdryer, working through the tangles until three in the morning.

Finally satisfied, he rose to put the equipment away and saw his cell phone on the dresser. He picked it up and turned it on.

A familiar electronic ditty bleeped, indicating a new message.

He debated deleting it without looking. However, given the hour and how late the caller must have left the voicemail, he couldn't ignore it.

It was from Mai. She wanted him to call her back. Time of the message was 1:40 AM.

She sounded pissed.

Apparently she wasn't expecting any other calls before three, because she was railing on Duke as soon as she picked up.

" _What the_ hell _did you screw up this time?"_ Mai demanded, voice muted and distant from the telephone receiver. _"Joey called me at_ midnight _, asking if there was any other way he could pay off our bet."_

While he was waiting for Mai to pick up the phone, Duke had situated himself on the bed once again. He sat back against the headboard and dragged a pillow into his lap. So they wanted to get as far away from him as possible. It figured. "I screwed up big time, Mai."

" _I guessed."_ Her retort was dry enough to make him thirsty. _"Wouldn't mind telling me why Joey suddenly has other plans to be 'uh, somewhere' on the night of the party?"_

Duke wanted to smile at the retort, but he couldn't. "I'm going to call it all off. I told them both today, Mai," he said, and slowly, carefully outlined the day for her. He was a bit harder on himself than he should have been in the telling. She knew that he would be, and allowed for it.

" _So let me get this straight…Joey admits he's got the hots for you—"_

"He didn't. He just wanted to—"

" _That's bullshit. Joey doesn't share_ anything _, Duke. Maybe he's deluded himself that he was asking just for Tristan. I'm pretty sure that part of it was totally good intentions. But you said you saw firsthand how possessive the guy gets around his sister. And he was spitting nails whenever Valon so much as looked at me cross-eyed."_

"So?"

" _So,"_ Mai echoed with a patient sigh, _"if you get off the pity bus for a couple of seconds—Joey's only been 'with' Tristan for what? No more than forty-eight hours, I'd say, judging from what you said._ If _that. And now suddenly he wants to share? Baby, if he doesn't even_ subconsciously _want your ass, he would never have offered that kind of deal in the first place."_

Duke paused to let this all sink in.

" _You lucky bastard,"_ the voice on the other line accused, a little brittle because the hour was so late, _"I can't even talk_ one _guy into getting into my pants, and you've got two ready to dive into yours."_

"You're cute when you exaggerate." Mai's words soothed Duke's seriously bruised ego, and – grudgingly – they let a little hope in as well. Irrational hope, but hope nonetheless. His natural skepticism wanted to reject it.

" _You don't believe me."_

"It doesn't make any sense," The one-shouldered shrug that followed was reflex, though Mai couldn't see it.

" _It will if you think about it,"_ Mai replied flatly.

"It's not possible."

" _Isn't it?"_ The tone from the other side of town was arch, indicating that Mai knew he'd been contemplating it. Indicating also that he and she both knew that yes, it _was_ possible.

"It doesn't stand a chance of working out." There. He had her. They both knew _that_ , too.

" _Oh, ye of little faith,"_ Mai laughed, and Duke heard the irritation running a little out of her voice. _"or did you forget who they are?"_

"What are you talking about?"

The silence on the other end was a long one. Just as Duke was expecting to hear the dial tone, she answered. She was different now, quieter and sober. As though the words she spoke were ones she'd given much thought to and was tentative to give away. _"They're different. We all are. You know that. I don't know if it's because loving Yugi made us all stretch our hearts a little bit more, or if everything's just stretched us a little further, period. But we're all different. If anybody could do it…if anybody can love more than one person and do it without being jealous…they can. They're not like anybody you've ever met."_

"Mai—"

" _Good night, Duke."_

The dial tone he'd been expecting came then as Mai abruptly cut him off. He listened to it for a little while before he hung up. In the morning, he would call Téa and explain that he wouldn't be teaching the boys for the rest of the week because he had a lot of work to catch up on. He did, so it wasn't exactly a lie.

Right now, however, he was too tired to do much of anything. Duke tossed the pillow out of his lap and scrooged down between his sheets. He reached out to set his cell phone on the bedside table and snapped off the light.


	17. Chapter 17

Exhausted, Joey turned off the phone and finally let his shoulders drop back against the wall above Tristan's bed. They felt sore, like he'd been hanging onto something too hard.

Released from his usual reserve, Tristan's cheek was snuggled against Joey's stomach, one powerful arm draped across his lap and forgotten there. The smell of applied paint faded long ago. Uncertain of what to do next, Joey moved his forearm from where it lay over the stretch of Tristan's shoulders and gripped the back of the other boy's neck instead.

It felt weird to be in this position. Tristan never _held_ him, really, or didn't do it before. But when Joey got knocked in the head during a fight and couldn't see straight, Tristan carried him home. As boys it never occurred to them to worry, and if the act itself was stupid it was _still_ heroic as far as Joey was concerned. A guy had to care a lot about you to carry you.

With his hand on the back of Tristan's neck, Joey felt like he was really doing the carrying for the first time. He was the one offering the hand up.

The trouble they faced wasn't like fighting with cards; wasn't like those deadly tournaments at all. This was simpler. More tangible and maybe even dangerous, but if they were hurt it would be between the two of them.

The three of them, he meant.

Remembering Duke's participation popped Joey's elation at offering comfort, and he let his head thunk back against the wall with a guilty sigh. It was his fault and Duke took the heat for him. Joey wanted to let it ride, normally _would_ have let it ride, but he knew it was also deeply wrong to do so. Personal honesty didn't mean much to him before, but it did now.

"She didn't swallow it, did she," Tristan said, morose tone implying a statement rather than a question.

"Considerin' she just got done bawlin' me out, I'd say no," Joey replied. His fingers sifted through the soft, short hair on the back of Tristan's neck. It felt like peach fuzz. Warm, damp peach fuzz. The central air was still not fixed.

"We can't go," Tristan's arm shifted in Joey's lap, and his cheek screwed a little tighter against the blond boy's stomach. "if we go, it'll just make things worse."

"He'll probably pretend we ain't there. He's good at that," Joey said, the corners of his mouth twisting up into a wry smile.

Tristan rolled his head back, gazing soberly up at Joey. They looked at one another in the dim light for a few seconds, before Joey shook his head. "Yeah, I know it wouldn't work. What're we gonna do?"

The minutes ticked by without a response. Once again the room was dark and illuminated only by the streetlamp shining through the slats in Tristan's window fan. The ambient whirr of the electric fanblade muffled their conversation, made it safe to talk about these things. The dark made it safe to talk about these things to one another.

Tristan returned his gaze to the wall, and he shrugged a little. "I'm sorry about earlier."

"Sorry for what?" Joey tugged on his hair, and then let go of him completely to fold his hands behind his head. "For cryin'? It happens, man. We've got nothin' but shit lately."

"No," Tristan said. Joey felt the light nudge of Tristan's cheek against his belly as the other boy tried to shake his head, "not that. For earlier. I…shouldn't have gotten mad…"

"Sure you should have," Joey broke in. He sensed more in the words than Tristan was saying, and waited.

"No, you don't get it. Let me finish."

Tristan sounded slightly petulant, like Mai after an interruption. Finding amusement in that regardless of the situation, Joey nodded and unfolded one hand from behind his head to pat the top of his friend's head.

He felt rather than saw the grimace Tristan pulled at the slightly patronizing gesture, and grinned in the dark.

"What I was going to say," Tristan's arm rose and tightened around his companion's midriff, fingers curling into a fist, "was that if it'd been me—I would've let him, too."

"Duke?" Joey asked for clarification after a pause. Tristan confirmed the name with a muttered apology and tried to bury his face against Joey's shirt. Fingertips curled and threaded through his hair, moving softly and giving him permission to stay there. Joey looked down at him, watching the orange, black-barred glow on his shoulder and back from the streetlight.

He was unprepared for the sudden little swell inside his chest and the strange, heady sensation of flight. A feeling of freefall. While a somewhat less focused section of his brain was celebrating over Joey's correct assessment of Tristan's feelings, another part of him…a larger part…was scared to death. Because the longer they lay here, the more Joey discovered that he liked the warmth in his arms.

Really liked it.

It surprised him, especially considering the ironic timing, until he realized that it hadn't been an immediate thing. Joey felt like someone shaken out of sleep – he _knew_ it was there before, or he would never let Tristan kiss him in the first place. Wouldn't have kissed Duke. The shock of Duke's attraction was his first clue. A half dozen other little things after that…and a couple really _big_ things, too…

How the hell did he _miss_ all that?

 _Too busy freaking out,_ Joey decided with a sigh, and finally let the whole of his body relax. Tristan felt his muscles shift, and he moved to accommodate.

"It'll work out, Joey," Tristan brushed a hand down his ribs.

"Huh?" The new affection seemed to come as easy as breathing to Tristan, which made him a little envious.

"Things can't be bad forever. You know? Somehow, we'll get it figured out."

The transition was so smooth that Joey hardly noticed it. The reassurance flowed warm in Tristan's voice, as though he'd seen his friend's thoughts. Joey smiled a little and flicked the back of Tristan's neck. "Lemme up, would ya? Too hot and sticky for this shit. I'm fine."

Tristan came to life slowly, and slid back. Joey folded up his legs and swung his feet over the edge of the bed. The spare sleeping bag lay on the floor, still rolled up and waiting.

He looked at its dark shape beside the desk. Looked up at Tristan. Chuckling a little, feeling curiously lighter than he had in days, Joey abruptly leaned over and pressed his mouth to Tristan's because he felt like it. "Sure bud, I know it will."

It wasn't _yet_ , but it could get better. He just needed to think about it. Joey got up and went to fetch the sleeping bag, feeling Tristan's eyes on him the whole time. It was a nice feeling.

He decided he liked that, too.

"Hey, Tris?" He asked, after he and the sleeping back were flat on the floor beside Tristan's bed.

"Mm?" The slightly drowsy voice came out of the shadows over his head. He heard the shift of blankets as Tristan moved closer to the edge of his bed. His nose and forehead caught the glow from the window, shadowy recesses under his brows hiding his eyes.

"How d'you do it? ….Deal, I mean." Joey turned on his side, folding an arm under his head so he could look up.

"Deal—this? Oh." For a minute, Tristan said nothing, apparently thinking over his answer. "I guess I just deal as it comes at me. I gotta, right?"

"The gay part. Doesn't that bug you?"

"What?"

"It doesn't?"

"What doesn't?"

"That you didn't—" Joey turned over on his back, gesturing helplessly in the dark. Tristan watched him, and Joey could feel the amusement coming off of him. He grunted and dropped his arms, grimacing. "Forget it."

"—That there was something in me I didn't know about?" Tristan suggested, tone low under the hum of the fan. "Sure it does. Your old man isn't gonna care one way or another and it ain't like you ever felt the need to tell him stuff, right?"

Joey shook his head. That was certainly true.

"Yeah, but see…I don't know what I'm gonna do," Tristan went on, "Don't know if I'm gonna tell my parents. Don't know if they'll care." He said the last bitterly, irritated at the situation in general.

"Aw, Tris, you got a great family," Joey reminded Tristan lazily.

"Yeah," Tristan replied, tone gentled. The fan filled the little silence between them as it grew more comfortable. "See, that's the only part that bothers me. You and me? Us and Duke? We don't break that easy. If stuff works out, then it's okay. If it doesn't, well, maybe it just wasn't supposed to."

"If it doesn't, are you gonna hate me?"

Joey knew he sounded like a little kid as soon as the words came out of his mouth. He grimaced. He could remember asking the same question from his mother for inane things as a child.

Tristan didn't laugh at him. "Hey, no talking like that, pal. No matter what happens, I couldn't ever hate you." His voice was muzzy with fatigue now, but firm.

Satisfied with the answer, Joey left the topic alone. A few minutes later, when Tristan softly asked him another question, the only reply was a snore.

* * *

The next morning, the pale green Cadillac wasn't in Téa's driveway. Tristan pulled into the spot where the oversized car usually parked. For once, Joey wasn't clinging to his waist on the back of the Yamaha. The blond boy didn't know he'd be here, as the two of them agreed earlier that lessons were out of the question. Tristan didn't enlighten him for a very good reason.

 

For the sake of certainty, he tried the studio door. It was locked. There was no reason to pause for thought – that was all done hours ago. Urgent purpose swelled inside his chest, pushing him to action, and Tristan dove down the steps to his bike.

His next stop was the Devlin game shop. A huge cardboard dragon turned lazily in the front window as he passed by and turned into the employee parking lot behind the building.

Immediately visible were the exaggerated tailfins of the Cadillac at the edge of the lot, bullet brake lights burning red in the early light.

The back door was locked as well. Frustrated with the growing amount of barriers, Tristan leaned sideways and bent at the knee with a grunt, fingertips probing beneath the second step of the fire escape. The extra key came loose and jingled into his hand.

Inside the building was blissfully cool. Tristan knew he was entering without permission, and didn't take the moment to appreciate the air conditioning in his upsurge of nerves.

"Dana? That you? You're early…suddenly developed a case of initiative?"

The familiar voice echoed into the back room and Tristan froze. Duke poked his head into the doorway between the back room and the front of the shop. The teasing smile he wore abruptly faded.

"I came to—" Tristan started quickly and found himself unable to explain _why_ he was there.

Duke snapped his sentence off halfway through. "What? You didn't leave anything here, I'm not sick, and you're not sorry."

The empty space between them in the dingy room grew awkward and thick with guilt. Duke's expression tightened. "Go home, Tristan."

"You don't just drop a _bomb_ like that on people and then vanish, you know!" Tristan spluttered.

"Unlike what _you_ were planning to do?" The retort was icy, laced with accusation.

Already on edge, Tristan bristled. " _Fuck_ you," he snarled, "this week's been hard enough without you dropping that load of crap about how you were screwing with us and then running out on—"

" _Breathe_ , Tristan."

"—I'm dealing with it the best way I know how!"

" _Your_ way constitutes half-baked excuses with the same result. At least I'm not lying. I'm just not showing up." Duke's palm slapped against the wood paneling of the doorframe as he spun the other direction.

"Don't walk away from me, dammit!" Tristan galloped after him, impeded by the boxes of stock piled on the floor. "I _hate_ it when you do that!" He turned the corner, missing that Duke had stopped and was turning around to snap something else at him. The low-speed collision knocked Duke back against the counter and bounced Tristan onto his rump.

They recovered their egos and glared at one another from their corners.

"Haven't you picked on me enough?" Duke demanded angrily, fists curling around the edge of the counter.

"How many times are you gonna pull a hit-and-run?" Tristan retorted, struggling up from the floor.

" _Me?_ _You_ were the one that—"

"Were you serious?"

"— _What?_ " The abrupt subject change left Duke reeling. "I know Joey isn't capable of holding a coherent thought longer than it takes to crack a peanut, but I never expected it from you."

"Just _answer_ me, goddammit."

"Just answer me, goddammit, _please_."

A sadistic grin crept across Duke's features. Seeing that, Tristan frothed. He was _enjoying_ this, the bastard! After everything…it really _was_ a game to him! The old, angry desperation started to burn again. It ran loose yesterday, and it was closer to the surface as a result. Maybe he just wasn't worth noticing. Duke was so much smarter than he was. The other guy could talk circles…

But as he was tensing to turn around and bolt, he heard Joey's voice echoing faintly out of his memory.

"… _what I don't get is this._ All _this. The dancin' and the hangin' out and agreein' to teach us how t'do the rumba…"_

"Please," Tristan forced out, teeth gritted with the effort.

Duke stared at him, the arrogance melting away. When he moved sideways and sagged once more against the counter, he just looked tired.

"I take it Joey didn't tell you what really happened, then."

* * *

"So you were lying," Tristan said slowly.

 

Duke gave an explosive sigh, exhausted from telling the story all over again. By the time he'd finished, there was an hour left before he unlocked the doors for the Saturday business day. He still had things left to do, and the faster he dealt with this, the sooner he could get on with something that didn't involve constant pain.

"Like I told you," he repeated with as much patience as he could muster, "Joey kissed me first. And I already told you why he did that. Maybe he's a weird kid, but he wasn't doing it to hurt you."

Either Tristan was slow on the uptake or he had a flair for dramatic pauses. Whatever the reason, he'd get it, get pissed, and get out in a few more seconds.

"No," Tristan shook his head, "see, that's not what I asked." His expression was carefully planed smooth. Duke jerked his head up to stare at the younger man in shock.

"You asked if I was lying. I answered that."

"No you didn't." Tristan replied, smiling to himself a little despite the situation. He pushed his hands into his pockets. "You do what you usually do. You answered something else and let me decide what you meant."

Duke's head dropped back with a long groan of frustration. "How would you _like_ me to answer the question?" _Are you ever going to stop harassing me?_ His tone demanded plaintively.

"'Yes' or 'no' would be _great_."

Silence dropped with an almost audible thud. Duke snapped his head up and stared at Tristan in shock. His eyes narrowed. "You know I don't lie." Let him make what he liked out of that.

Tristan swallowed noisily, but held firm. "That's not 'yes' or a 'no,' Duke."

" _Fine._ " The ponytail flipped violently from one side to the other as Duke shook himself and stood away from the counter. Green eyes narrowed and glittering dangerously, he stalked the five steps between himself and Tristan. "You want a straight answer? _No_. I didn't lie to you. Maybe I…adjusted a couple of things," he lifted his chin the quarter of an inch necessary to glare up at Tristan, "but what I said was true. All of it. Every. Last…" Another step invaded Tristan's personal space, "…Word."

He was close. Way too close. Threatened, Tristan felt his mouth go dry. Bitter adrenaline tasted on the back of his tongue. "…hang on…" he pleaded weakly, reversing a step to put some air between himself and Duke. He was beginning to regret poking the proverbial bear with a stick. Now the animal was awake and angry and tearing at the remainder of his self control.

" _No_ , I wasn't playing with you," Duke plunged on, coming after Tristan. His fists clenched at his sides, shoulders and forearms trembling with tension. "I never expected _you two_ to hook up, dammit! Since when have you idiots done anything the easy way?" Duke paused when he realized he was being stared at. " _What_?"

Duke would never normally label Tristan as impulsive.

Impulsive, however, aptly described the lips crushing unexpectedly against his own. Tristan caught Duke's cheeks between his hands and covered the other's mouth in one smooth, quick motion.

Reflex took over where thought ended. Cold shock registered along with a rush of adrenaline and Tristan found himself being shoved roughly away. He staggered. Mouths separated with a muted wet _pop_.

"You…" Duke trailed off. It was his turn to stare.

His eyes tightened.

"You _bastard_!" He threw himself hard at Tristan and the pair of them stumbled back into the doorway to the store room. Tristan cringed away from him instinctively, tensing, expecting a fist to come blazing into his chin.

Instead, he found arms wrapping tightly around his neck, and lips plied hard to his own. Blunt fingertips dug into the back of his neck. His hands flexed frantically an inch away from Duke's skin.

Something inside was breaking; somehow tension slid out of his mind and shoulders and neck and into his stomach and thighs and the tips of his fingers. Slowly, Tristan's hands moved around Duke's waist, encouraged by the arch of willowy warm body that settled closer to him with the touch. Reality blurred around the edges like the eyes of a drunk and the tilt of the world turned sluggish and slow.

It was a major improvement over being slugged.

Eventually Duke relinquished his death grip on the back of Tristan's neck, and the warmth of his palm traced down over collarbone and chest, rubbing at the muscle through his shirt. They pulled apart and looked at one another, silently weighing what had just occurred.

Duke's eyes were bright with feeling and the most living shade of green that Tristan had ever seen. The color and depth of them hypnotized. Meeting his gaze for any length of time now had an electric undercurrent that made his stomach quiver.

"It could work," Tristan breathed, feeling better at this moment than in the past month. He was giddy with the realization; the whole coming together at the right angles now. The twinge of guilt at tracking Duke down without Joey's knowledge slipped backward in lieu of gut-trembling excitement at the prospect.

The life in Duke's gaze snapped off like a light. "I…want you to leave." He licked his lips and looked down quickly, and stepped back. Hands slipped away from Tristan's skin and clenched again, the tightness of shoulders and arms rapidly returning. "Go…home."

"What? But I—"

"You don't know what you're asking! Neither of you do!"

"That's not what—"

"And…you don't treat _friends_ the way you're treating me. If you don't mind, I have a business to run. I need to finish opening. What I don't need is you or _your_ boyfriend's harassment."

"We weren't trying to harass you!"

"Lessons are off. Téa's coming home Sunday. You can work with her then."

"Will you just listen to me for a second, please?"

"Why? So you can jerk me around again? You're not the guy I thought you were. You and Joey both. Maybe what I did was wrong. But at least I'm willing to _stop_ now." He turned away and snatched up the keys from the counter. There was no response while he walked to the front door, but he could feel eyes on him the entire way. Rapid footsteps started at last; the soft click of a closing door after that.

Duke winced at the sound, hand quiet on his key for a moment as he gently lay his forearm against the aluminum frame and sagged forward.

The moment passed, and he got on with opening the shop.


	18. Chapter 18

True to his word, Duke was not at lessons Monday morning. Joey and Tristan wanted to see Téa, and they were not disappointed when they climbed the stairs to the studio. Visibly distressed by the past week's events – particularly Friday's – she sat on the floor with them in the cool breath of the floor fan and demanded to know everything.

Her arms and face were slightly browner than they had been when she left, as her family up the coast had a large houseboat and made the most of it during the week. Conceding to the heat, her hair was secured behind a yellow sweatband across her forehead and clipped in the back with a pink plaid claw barrette. The ends stuck out at strange angles from the clip and twitched in the breeze of the fan.

"Why can't we be in your room?" Joey complained, swiping the back of his hand across the sweat on his upper lip, "you've got air conditioning in there. It's _hot_ out here."

"No boys in my room," Téa replied primly. Tristan snickered.

"But you lock the door to the studio," he observed with a smug grin.

"But the studio isn't air conditioned," Téa retorted archly.

"Yeah, an' it's _hot_ ," Joey reiterated.

"Exactly," Téa said, turning back to look at Tristan once more. Realization dawned on him and he laughed.

"Couldn't we go downstairs?"

"I doubt you guys are going to want my parents listening in," Téa replied with a shrug, and the little trio quieted. "Come on, I said I wanted to know what happened, and I do. Tell me."

"You're gonna think we're idiots."

"Or jerks," Joey volunteered, hanging his head. Tristan told him about his earlier run-in with Duke, and the accusations hit home pretty hard.

Téa shook her head. "I promise I won't think that about you." At their dubious looks, she rolled her eyes. "I know you guys too well to think you'd ever _try_ to hurt Duke. Give me some credit – I had to put up with a pair of clowns for a whole week at Duelist Kingdom, didn't I? And Battle City?"

"We _get_ it, Téa," Tristan groaned, falling back on his hands. He bent one knee and looped an arm around it, shifting all of his weight onto one wrist. "It was just a warning."

"Warning acknowledged. Now start talking."

Over the next hour, she patched pieces of the story together from each boy's account. They matched up with Duke's vague explanations almost perfectly. However, he was wrong about their intentions. Both Joey and Tristan were struggling with how unmanageable the situation had become, as well as balancing their own comfort against the happiness of the other two boys.

She was surprised by how much her friends changed in a week. The two boys sitting across from her suddenly were mature and methodical. Joey told a coherent story without grabbing the back of his head or departing on a tangent. He seemed unnaturally sober. His sacrificing personality had been exploited to its limits with no visible reward. His friends were hurting and he was unsure how much of it had been his doing. _He_ was hurting.

Tristan was unusually still while he spoke. The longer he went on, the quieter his body became. Familiar hand gestures vanished. His expression planed smooth with the exception of an occasional self-deprecating smile.

He was bottled up tight, Téa realized with a flash of prescience. His current behavior was hauntingly familiar. The old Tristan was there. Just underneath the stony, self-hating surface was a tumble of unspoken feelings. In his growing desperation, he'd forgotten how to deal with them.

Téa could sense the tension directed at one another, and at her. "I think you all need to get away from each other," she said, finally.

"No Téa, you don't understand—!" Joey started. Téa cut him off with a dismissive wave.

"I didn't mean _permanently_ ," she explained, "I meant for a while. Just because you don't see one another for a while doesn't mean that you won't still be friends."

After a long pause, Joey nudged Tristan with his elbow. "I knew she was gonna throw the word 'friend' in there somewhere," he said with a half-hearted grin. Téa glared at him, and he threw up both hands in submission. "I was joking, Téa. Geez."

"Be serious for ten minutes," Téa's lips pressed into a thin white line of annoyance. She sat up from where she'd been leaning on her palms, and laced her fingertips together in her lap. "There's no lessons this week, and I don't think you should visit each other." She glimpsed the resistance in their eyes, and sighed. "I can't _make_ you not be together. But you should figure out how you feel on your own."

A minute or two passed with no response, and she opened her mouth to add another disclaimer to the request.

"She's right," Tristan said quietly. Joey looked up at him in surprise. The brunet boy turned to meet his eyes.

"…Yeah, okay," Joey agreed at last, dropping his gaze.

Téa surveyed the pair with an unreadable expression and nodded. "Good," she unfolded her legs and allowed herself a languid stretch before rising. "But before you go home, I want to see you dance."

She bent, strands of hair escaping from her clip to curl around her face, and extended her hand to Tristan, who gazed up at her curiously.

"Oh, come on," she wheedled, "Duke said it was 'the first time I've seen them cooperate for anything beyond a tag-team.' Don't tell me you're _shy_."

"I'm not," Joey retorted, bouncing to his feet. "C'mon, Tris." His tone lacked its usual energy, but still held the same invitation. Tristan curled his hand around Téa's and pulled himself to his feet.

"All right," he groaned, "I'm coming."

* * *

Téa watched the motorcycle pull past the front of the house from the windows, and turned immediately for the closed door to her room after they drove out of sight. The little space was bliss as it exhaled cool air into her face and pushed damp tendrils of hair away from her cheeks. She didn't stay to enjoy the sensation, and plunged instead towards the cordless phone on her bureau.

She dialed Mai's cell phone number and braced her free hand on the foot of the bed as she slowly lowered herself down to sit. As expected, in four rings the older girl's voicemail picked up.

"Hi, it's Téa," she said, hunching over the phone in concentration, "Need to talk to you about the boys. I made a real mess, huh?" Her own unexpected false laugh irritated her. Nerves. "Anyway, give me a call."

The quiet of Téa's room was thick and uncomfortable after she hung up. She yanked the clip and headband out with an aggressive twist and lay back, squirming sideways until she found a pillow.

None of this was turning out the way she intended. Téa curled slender arms around the puffy purple chenille. The fabric was cool and she tucked her nose into it. Miserable blue eyes meditated on the cordless next to her while she counted over all of her mistakes.

When Duke professed an interest in Tristan over a year ago, Téa discouraged it. He was more than passably cute and very kind, but also very _straight_. They had enough problems in their lives without the discomfort that a refusal would cause, however polite. More than anything, she didn't want to see her friends in pain over a misunderstanding.

She expected it to go away.

It persisted.

While she taught Duke to dance and as a result spent more time in his company, she began to realize how deep the feelings ran. She knew Joey and Tristan, but not quite as well as _he_ did. With the same meticulous consideration that he gave everything else in his life, he learned and remembered whatever they would give him. Yet he still remained detached. He had never visited Joey's apartment; did not know Tristan's extended family. When questioned, he asked: wasn't this what friends did?

The words were meant to needle Téa, and they did. The original plan was not entirely hers, but she collaborated with Mai to bring Tristan and Duke together, by way of Joey's dance lessons. A little convenient blackmail was her subtle revenge on Duke for not listening to her warning. She also knew that by tricking him into the extra work, he would be too irritated to plan his own seduction. He could be charming, she thought, when he wasn't _trying_ to be charming.

No more playing with other people's feelings _ever_ , she decided, and blinked hard at the suddenly blurry phone lying on the coverlet. Was Mai _ever_ going to call back?

When the phone finally _did_ ring. Téa rolled over and pounced on it, abandoning her pillow. "Mai?"

" _For the record,"_ Mai answered, _"I don't think this is your fault."_

Upon hearing the familiar voice, Téa sagged against the phone in her hand. "Yes it is. I pushed them."

" _You didn't make them interested in men, did you?"_

"Didn't I? A week of isolation with _Duke Devlin_?"

" _Duke Devlin doesn't make people gay, Téa,"_ Mai corrected between giggles.

"I was the one who suggested Serenity come along. She has friends. She could have stayed with them. I lured Tristan…"

" _Hon, I don't think it's possible to lure Tristan into anything he really doesn't want to do. So it's gotten messy. Guess what? Life's not clean. Setups like this rarely go according to plan."_

Téa reached for her pillow again. "Then I guess…" She said slowly, "the only thing to do is fix it."

" _That's out of your hands now,"_ Mai reminded gently, _"They're big boys. They'll handle it. Besides,"_ she interrupted when Téa moved to make another objection, _"I think they're going to surprise you."_

"They already have," Téa replied soberly, but didn't attempt to argue further. She picked at the edge of the pillow, worrying loose fluffy purple strands of chenille. "I asked them all to stay apart for the rest of the week."

" _I think that's wise."_ Mai sounded as though she were waiting for something more.

"I don't know if they'll _do_ it or not. They're so—" She bit off, finishing the sentence mentally. _They're so attached to one another._

They were big boys. They could handle it. More than likely, they'd handle it together. She still felt responsible, and she was. That platitude about how the road to hell was paved with good intentions made more sense, but she had a growing gut feeling that despite all this misery the destination would be different.

Maybe what they needed were a few less roadblocks. Téa sat up suddenly, lips parted, eyes wide and palm pressed to her forehead.

"… _Téa?"_ Mai ventured.

"—I have an idea!"

* * *

Tristan sat on the edge of his bed in the dark, turning over the slender black Discman in his hands. There was too much he didn't want to think about, and without Joey or someone else to distract him he couldn't put a lid on it. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday crawled without the lessons; too little to do and too much time to do it in.

He volunteered to watch Georgie for his sister earlier in the day. She was very close to her due date, and she had a prenatal appointment in the morning. Their mother went with her, leaving Tristan to entertain his two-year-old nephew.

During the construction of flimsy, brightly painted plastic racetrack that turned the kitchen floor into a stock car rally, Tristan found himself thinking about his friends. Joey and Georgie were at a stalemate due to their vast difference of opinion regarding one Seto Kaiba, but they got along if the subject didn't come up.

Duke, on the other hand, never met Georgie. He claimed to hate small children and had no patience for anything under the age of fifteen. While Tristan pushed his little white pickup truck up the ramp – in a squiggly line because the front axel was bent from a heavy foot in the middle of the night – he imagined Duke watching him. The full lips bore a perplexed quirk, and the green eyes were trained over his shoulder with the boy's unnerving concentration.

Would he even _know_ how to play? Tristan wondered then, and wondered now as he set his Discman aside and reached for his headphones. His own childhood had been stripped away faster than he liked to think about, leaving the years of scary and dark unknown ahead to worry about. But at least he _had_ one, whereas Duke…didn't. Was it childish to want to show Duke how to play?

He missed Duke, missed him and Joey and the dance lessons more than he expected to, and it was only Wednesday. At the same time he dreaded the upcoming weekend, with the fear normally reserved for history tests he hadn't studied for.

Tristan slid the headphones over his ears, and got to his feet slowly, feeling the stretch of thigh and calf muscles as they bore his weight. The disc in the CD player was one from Téa's collection, and when he pressed 'play,' sound split the silence wide open in rapid Spanish. His eyes closed, chin lowered like a man trying to remember a forgotten name, and he nodded to the percussive heartbeat. The undercurrent bass was slow and deep and the voices were smooth, suiting both his mood and his simple movements. He slid forward, clutching his Discman a little away from his side, and rolled his hips to the right. The tendons and muscles stretching there felt good.

He blanked his mind. The dark against his eyelids pushed every distraction away, until he was left with the movement of air against his skin, the contract and relax of muscle and the deep rhythm of the music.

Syllables pinged like gunfire and pulled him away from the Rumba's traditional to-and-fro. He stepped into the motion with his whole body, arching neck and back and swinging his arms in a slow-motion tribal dance. He punched the air, easy and controlled and so he grimaced in surprise at the unexpected tension tugging his shoulders. It slipped away as he continued, lost in the warmth of movement and the cool sweat trickling down the furrow of his spine. In that moment it was better than sex; better than screaming ninety miles an hour down the highway. His free hand found the nape of his neck and gripped there a moment, and slid down his chest, fingers spread. When they touched his stomach, he felt the familiar pressure at the edges of his mind and let the images in without a fight.

He imagined the warmth of familiar hands against his stomach, replacing his own while the music pulsed with the sideways slide and twist and _la inocencia perdida_. In his mind wet lips caressed his shoulder and he moved his fingertips there to feel the spot for moisture. The imagery began to outrun him as it strengthened, and he grew wilder, making noise that could be heard downstairs and not caring. Not caring. Not _caring_. He took joy in the simple movements and his ability to do them well, and in the freedom that the empty nighttime space afforded.

When his fingers were too numb to cling to the Discman and dance at the same time, he gave up and lay in the middle of the floor, shoulders hot and sticking to the carpet, eyes still closed against the dark.

He wondered if the others were doing the same thing. He wondered if they danced at night too; if they thought about him. If they danced as though he was with them.

The idea was a little frightening, but with the solid wall of sound in his ears, he still smiled.

* * *

Duke never remembered dreams. When his eyes opened in the morning, the memories skipped out with only the vague impression that _something_ took place between ten and five. It had the same niggling feel as walking out of the house, knowing he'd forgotten something.

The leftover tangibles were usually not so obvious. Occasionally he awoke tangled in sweat-drenched sheets. Sometimes his eyes were puffy and sore. Once, he'd come to life abruptly with a scream snapped off in his throat. The neighbors looked at him strangely that morning, and thereafter he took to keeping his windows tightly shut.

He knew that therapists and psychiatrists might help. But therapists and psychiatrists might open up more than the question of lost dreams, and his life was functioning well without consciously inflicting more trouble.

Now however he curled in on himself upon waking, arms wound around his bent knees as he struggled against his inevitable amnesia to _remember_ what had just happened to him. He had no strong thread to hold to, the images were slipping away until only tatters remained.

_No matter how they stood, one of them was always between the other two. It was frustrating, like trying to fix a broken zipper._

_Joey's arms came around him, and all he could see were Tristan's eyes staring in accusation. Hazel was brown and green at once, with an orange ring around the pupil. He'd looked closely at them before when Tristan wasn't paying attention. They were pretty even when they were damning him._

_A soap opera. This was a fucking soap opera and he wanted out._

Duke groaned at his own melodramatic subconscious, and let his head thump back against his black lacquer headboard. There was more. His dreams changed after that. The images there were easier to hold to, and these he began to recall with growing clarity as the minutes wore on.

_Something shoved Duke back. He cried out in surprise when it happened, and stumbled an arm's length away from both. His eyes closed in defeat as he regained his balance._

_He felt them touch him._

Duke shuddered with the false memory. He hadn't really felt the touch in the dream, but here in the waking present his mind supplied the warm roughness of Tristan's calluses and Joey's slightly sticky palms.

_When he could see them again, they were close to him, and invited him closer while he watched. His chest ached like a bruise, but when some part of him recognized it for a dream simply because of the wild improbability of the situation, he leaned against them and let them do the same. The air between them seemed to glow a little with their shared warmth. Neither one kissed him, only curled an arm across his shoulders. Over it all he could feel the raw want in his own body, rising in a surge of selfishness. He wanted what they had. Wanted what they wanted to offer him._

_Somehow he wasn't standing between them._

The soft whisper of touch shook Duke's frame with unexpected arousal, and he let his fingertips trail down bare arms. Nothing so simple ever had such an effect on him before. When they had him, he felt…happy. It was a strange kind of happy – not the kind he usually felt for triumphs and small pleasures, but a softer, solid kind. Instead of being ready to move on to the next one, he wanted to stay. He didn't want to look for anything more.

It was _disturbing_.

Duke shook his head hard and snapped the sheets off of his knees, slithering to the edge of his bed. He willed the dream to be forgotten like the others. It stubbornly remained, pushing insistently at the edges of his psyche, tugging plaintively on his thoughts like a neglected child.

Resisting with shame the childish urge to tuck his nose against his knees, Duke shoved away his envy at the other two counterparts of this small and unexciting drama. They were probably asleep at this hour.

Not for the first time, he wondered if he was right. Or if they were thinking about him, too.

* * *

If Tristan's neighbors happened to peer across the street, they might have seen the lean silhouette of a boy in the long gray shadow of the red maple beside the Taylor house, leaning into the ancient tree like he was part of it. He was looking up, shaggy head thrown back as he communed with the closed second story window. His hands were pressed behind his back, fingers feeling over the grooves in the bark.

Joey dragged in two hours after curfew, but his father was asleep by then so there was no reason to worry. He walked down the hall to his room, stripping off his tee shirt as he moved, and closed the door softly behind him to avoid disturbing the snores a few feet away.

His palms still carried the buzzing feel of rough bark.


	19. Chapter 19

It was hard to hang onto a consistent level of depression when your sister was taking you to a _boutique._

Or at least…it was hard to be depressed and be _serious_ about it. Right about then the best that any guy could be expected to dredge up was acute, deadly embarrassment. Tristan figured he had _that_ nailed, and then some.

Tristan dropped his head against his seat with a _thump_ , lolling to one side to look out the back passenger window of Erin's little Corolla. Back when Erin suggested that she accompany him to pick up the formalwear, it _seemed_ sound enough. Back then, however, Tristan was about as interested in appearances as he was in frilly pink chiffon, and if someone else volunteered to keep the rented tuxedo unwrinkled on the way home, he wouldn't turn down the help.

Things were a little different now. The suit _mattered_ now. It was his armor, his protection against the hordes of beautiful, staring fashion-magazine people that his panic-fevered brain imagined whenever he called up the thought of Mai's gala. It _mattered_ what people thought of him. Two in particular.

"Tristan, are you feeling okay?" Erin asked. Her eyes flicked up, catching his gaze in the rearview mirror. She looked…if not _worried,_ then mildly surprised to see him moping like a cast member on a teenage reality show.

"Yeah," Tristan hurried to reassure, and looked away.

"Thank you for offering to pick up my dress, Tristan," Serenity added demurely from the front seat, adding insult to injury as she reminded Tristan of her presence.

It wasn't that he didn't _want_ her there. Up until the beginning of last week he'd been looking forward to taking her to the gala with a mix of anticipation and raw fear.

Now all of his energy was directed toward her brother, all the fear and nerves and intensity directed his way, and while Serenity still _meant_ something it was just…she wasn't…

The realization almost made him blush with guilt, and that didn't make _any_ sense. He used to feel a little bad about wanting his best friend's sister, now he felt sort of guilty because he _didn't_?

No wait… _didn't_ he? Had he ever? When did he stop? Did that make him—?

Erin swung right at a red light. Tristan snatched for the handle above the window before his seatbelt jerked him back.

 _Get a grip._ There was nobody here to handle the problem for him, nobody to talk him down. The logistics and the labels of what he'd done already and _could_ do in the future were flat-out scary, but he'd already _had_ this discussion. He dropped back into his seat and rolled his head toward the open window, sticky wind striking his face.

"Tristan?" Erin asked again, "I think she was talking to you."

Flustered, Tristan rushed through a disjointed excuse, and watched through the side mirror as Serenity's gentle mouth curved in amusement. "I couldn't really take you there on the bike," Tristan explained, slouching in his seat as he touched the edges of misery and embarrassment again without meaning to. He didn't like how Serenity had ended up on the outside of the equation, though in some small corner of his mind he saw and appreciated the irony of the situation. It meant too many things had changed already, in just one summer.

"You're welcome, though," Tristan added hurriedly, before Erin could give him another funny look through the rearview mirror, "no problem. This way your dress won't get all wrinkled."

Serenity nodded, a birdlike bob of her head and another smile, and then she and Erin picked up a conversation about the dress, leaving Tristan to pretend he was part of the upholstery.

He allowed himself one single moment more of weakness, and wished devoutly that Joey was there.

* * *

"Why's it gotta be _blue_ , Mai?"

"Because I'm not about to be seen with anyone in a camouflage vest, Joey," Mai called from the mouth of the men's changing rooms.

"But _y'know_ I _HATE_ blue!" Joey retorted from the stall at the back. Blue jeans thwacked the door with cold vengeance, and swung over the top to hang there while Joey shimmied into a pair of black slacks. "…'specially _this_ blue!"

"That is _not_ my problem, hon," Mai snapped, and shivered inside the tight fit of her dress, ducking her head to adjust the bust of the strapless bodice, "If you'd picked something _other_ than RealTree six weeks ago, we wouldn't be havingthis discussion."

"The fact that y'know what RealTree is, is just fu—freakin' scary, Mai."

Mai shrugged, and once again looked down to rearrange her décolletage. "I'm a progressive woman. You're my date, so we should match."

"Who says?" Joey's disembodied voice challenged from the other side of the room. Mai tipped her head, smiling at the white socks visible underneath the door and the black slacks that fell in concertina folds around Joey's ankles, forgotten, while he wrestled with his vest.

"Tradition," Mai replied, resisting another shrug at the risk of disturbing her dress. She reminded herself to either keep all shrugging to a minimum, or wear the detachable straps.

"What about blue camouflage?"

" _Joseph._ "

"All right, all _right_ ," Joey sighed, "keep y'girdle on, I'm comin' out."

The cubicle door clicked open. Mai looked up. She smiled, and Joey glowed in the moment of that beaming approval. He padded down the narrow passage in his socks, dark slick cuffs swishing just right against his ankles. He felt like James Bond. He felt like Indiana Jones, about to climb down a rope from a Nazi-ridden hall with a beautiful woman in an evening gown on his arm. He felt like one big damn hero.

Mai wasn't quite _that_ impressed. "Where's the bow tie?"

"Aw, _Mai_ , why've I gotta wear that frigging thing? I'm gonna choke in it! 'Sides, I think it looks sexier with the collar undone." He waggled his eyebrows, and in spite of Mai's attempts to maintain her position as Heartless Fraulëin of Eveningwear, she laughed.

"All right, I suppose you _could_ actually…" She conceded, then broke off as Joey looked past her, face losing all expression. With a sinking stomach, Mai turned to see what had caught his attention.

Téa stood on the other side of the boutique, spanning the doorway with spread arms as she herded her suddenly reluctant companion into the shop.

"Huh," Joey whuffed, and continued tonelessly, "figured he'd've gotten his tux already, ordered it special from Greece're something." His eyes snapped back to Mai. "C'n we go? I'm done, seriously, lemme just pay for the suit an' let's get outta here."

Mai deadpanned, ignoring his discomfort _and_ the tall ponytailed boy pretending to be a wall shadow on the other side of the room. "Would you mind letting me change first, hon?"

"Wh—oh. Heh, yeah, no problem Mai," Joey said, and looked over her shoulder again. His smile flashed and vanished as abruptly as a lightning strike. He withdrew a little toward the fitting room, wearing a guarded look. Mai didn't have to turn around to know Duke mirrored it.

Mai swallowed an inward sigh, patted Joey's arm – making him jump – and skirted him to head for the women's changing room. Boys were just too much effort; every last one was secretly a drama queen waiting for a cue. That was fine, if only they wouldn't _persist_ in pretending otherwise.

She would have thrown a sympathetic smile at Téa on her way past, if the other young woman had been able to pay attention. Which she wasn't.

"You didn't tell me they'd be here!" Duke whispered to Téa in a passionate undertone, spreading his hands. He didn't hiss, though he _was_ thinking about it.

Unmoved, Téa folded her arms. "Is everyone expected to schedule their lives around yours?" She pressed her lips together tight against further retort. "I didn't know they were going to be here today. It makes sense though, given that it _is_ the day before the dance and the thought of leaving Joey alone with a rented tux for longer than forty-eight hours makes me cringe."

Duke blinked and smiled, momentarily distracted from the source of his agitation. "Why, Téa, you've gotten _catty_ since the last time I saw you."

"And you've _always_ been catty. But do I hold it against you?"

"At least with _me_ there's no unexpected mood swings."

Téa rolled her eyes and pushed her totebag against his chest, trusting him to catch it. "Just pretend he's not over there for fifteen minutes."

"But—!" Duke started, protesting both the bag and the plan at once.

"—Or…you know…you could _talk_ to him," Téa added with a touch of impatience, "the way _most_ humans communicate?" She pointed at the flowery pink-and-orange canvas bag. "Hold that for me while I go get my dress."

Duke watched her back away, giving her his best hurt glare. _Why are you being so mean to me?_

 _Because you're being silly,_ said Téa's quirked lips and lowered eyelids. She turned away to greet the approaching store clerk, leaving him momentarily alone. With a martyred air, Duke sighed and – after looking over the totebag for a few seconds – slid the pink canvas straps onto his shoulder to wait for her.

A few minutes passed quietly while both boys held their ground in an uneasy stalemate, each pretending that the other didn't exist. Then, from across the room, Joey happened to spot the multicolored canvas tote dangling from Duke's shoulder, and wolf-whistled. Duke – who had noticed a mirror on his own side of the room and was trying to find a pose that made the decidedly feminine bag seem somehow _less_ emasculating – looked up in surprise. He searched for the source of the sound, spotted Joey across the racks of formalwear between them. Joey's good-natured smile widened into a smirk. _Guilty as charged_ , said the canine flash of white teeth.

Duke's eyes narrowed. He turned back to the mirror, pretending once again that Joey was not on the other side of the room leering at him. From his peripheral vision he watched as Joey's face fell, then slid back up into a sneer.

"Yanno," Joey began conversationally, head-and-shoulders above the sea of sequins and taffeta print, "I gotta give you credit. Doin' the whole 'progressive man' thing." Joey cribbed the words from Mai, minutes ago, but Duke didn't know that. He even threw in airquotes for good measure.

Duke looked as shocked as if one of the mannequins had begun to speak. A few seconds' delay dragged by. "I don't know _what_ you're talking about," he shot back, sluggish.

"The _bag_ , man," Joey explained cheerfully, realizing that he'd somehow _just one-upped Duke Devlin,_ "Makes sense yanno…lots more room than just a damn wallet. Y'can keep…what…y'keys in there," Joey raised his eyes toward the ceiling, ticking a list of items off on his fingertips, "…extra dice in case y'gotta give some slob a concussion, y'extra leotard, Kleenex, condoms, coupla magazines an' y'eyeshadow…"

"Do you _ever_ shut up?"

"—What I don't get is the orange-and-pink, dude. Those are _totally_ not your colors."

Before Duke could do more than register the insult and shift from staring to glaring, a soft hand curled around his elbow and tugged him back. He turned and found Téa's expectantly upturned face three inches below his own. "Duke?"

Duke snorted, half in surprise, and traded one more glance with Joey before focusing on Téa completely. "He _started_ it," he retorted heatedly.

"Duke-"

"He **_did_**."

"—The _dress_?"

" _What?_ "

Gingerly, Téa plucked the handles of her purse from Duke's shoulder and backed away, spreading her arms in silent invitation to _stop_ doing whatever dumb thing he was in the middle of doing and _look_.

"Oh," Duke said intelligently, flummoxed. Pause. Breathe. "Oh, _very_ nice, Téa."

Téa blossomed with a smile. In comparison to Mai, her dress was much less elaborate, deep rosy-purple satin and clinging chiffon, with a graceful ankle-length skirt. The fit of it was snug from shoulders to hips, then flowed outward. It trimmed her up. It showed her off. It was maybe the sexiest thing she'd ever worn.

Duke couldn't help being just a little jealous. Well. Not of the _dress_ of course (though he did sort of like that color), but of the way it changed her, without changing her into someone else.

On the other side of the room, Joey seemed to have taken notice as well. The two boys stared at her as if a rare tropical bird had suddenly landed on the coat racks. To Duke, she was aesthetically lovely, which he already _knew_ ; he had danced with her in a dress not unlike this one, though in the competition she'd glittered with sequins, fluttered with marabou, and the beading hurt his hands.

To Joey…it was as if the Téa he knew, _his_ Téa, had somehow been kidnapped and replaced with an imposter, or someone (her fairy godmother?) had waved a wand over her head and transported her into adulthood in the time it took to blink.

Duke knew this woman. She and Joey were still getting acquainted.

"Téa, ya look—" Joey started, and got no further when he was cut off by Mai and the pile of blue satin and sequins she pushed into his arms. After a distracted, miserable moment of confusion, he recovered his voice and swallowed. "—Ya look really nice, Téa."

Without answering either boy, Téa smiled, set aside her purse and stretched out her left hand to Duke, right hand drawn up gracefully to the side.

Inviting him to dance.

Duke watched her warily; licked his lips and swallowed. "What, here?"

Téa continued to smile, trusting that he would rescue her. Continued to hold her pose. The slick evening-sky satin whispered against her legs.

The instrumental muzak in the boutique paused, and before Duke could protest, slid into a perfect three-beat waltz. Well, hell.

The world went into slow-motion.

While Joey and Mai watched, Duke stepped forward, extended his right hand towards her left, curled his fingertips lightly around hers and invited her in.

Joey let out a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding; realized with a start that he'd never seen Duke dance with Téa until now. He touched Mai on the shoulder, and pointed toward the pair, needlessly asking her to point her attention where it was already focused.

"That's my boy," Joey whispered, grinning, puffed with pride, "Just you watch. He and Téa, they taught me how t'do this dance too."

Mai said nothing. She was still beside him, and Joey tapped her until she glared at him, just to make sure she hadn't forgotten to breathe too.

"Why are you still in your tux?" Mai asked sharply.

Joey groaned, "Lemme alone," but didn't move.

"You look beautiful," Duke said when his right side met Téa's left. His voice was too low to be heard across the room, and by that time he'd forgotten about their audience, anyway. Téa's slender spine arched to keep the righthand pressure, Duke's fingertips just touching one bare shoulderblade, exposed by the low back of her dress. This, he knew how to do. This, he understood. He responded to it, and led Téa a few graceful circles to the muffled gritty strains of _Moon River_ over the budget sound system. The sound quality didn't matter, really - No music was really necessary; footsteps made and drove the rhythm.

"I thought maybe you'd forgotten," Téa said, one bare foot sliding behind and to the side as Duke supported her gradual lean back within his arms.

"Forgot you were beautiful?" Duke said to Téa's stomach.

"No," Téa rose, allowing Duke to sweep her in another small circle and twirl her out to the ends of his fingertips, "and watch it. Any more of that and you'll sound like some hack beefcake from _The Young and the Restless_." She laughed, gently, because the world was still in slow motion for them and had yet to accelerate. Her dress uncurled from around her legs, swished to a stop. "I thought maybe you forgot why you're still dancing with me. Because, you know, you _used_ to dance 'cause you liked it."

Téa's hand slid from Duke's, and the two of them looked at one another in silence, until Duke's surprise translated into a slow smile.

"Aw, _shit_."

The world snapped back to full speed.

Duke's head snapped to the left, where Tristan's familiar silhouette filled the doorway. It was his voice that disturbed the uneasy peace; his voice that gave him away though he was still a featureless silhouette backlit by the sun.

Tristan edged into the showroom and along the front wall, his only exit blocked by Serenity and Erin's full heavy belly as the girls followed him into the boutique. Both women looked deeply concerned by Tristan's behavior and the almost tangible air of tension and distress in the room. On opposite sides of the floor, Téa and Mai exchanged quick looks. Mai was expressionless, but the pressure of her hand suddenly on Joey's elbow tightened enough to distract him from staring like a wary Rottweiler. When she caught Téa's glance, without shifting her gaze Mai tilted her head a fraction in Tristan's direction and lifted her eyebrows. As far as she was aware, Téa's 'grand plan' did not involve kindling The Second Civil War. In fact, _none_ of this was part of the plan. So what were they going to do now?

Safely shielded behind Duke's shoulder from the rest of the onlookers, Téa gestured at her own evening gown. Mai expected her to hit the trenches in that?

Mai raised her free hand just above the dress racks, palm up in silent surrender and absolution. _This is not my fault._

Téa snorted. Her soft exhale and rustle of fabric attracted Duke's attention, who turned back and caught her. Téa felt him shift and looked up, to see him looking down, curiosity lacing his gaze. She glared. Duke rolled his eyes and turned back to watch the fireworks.

"…Hi," Erin ventured cautiously into the heavy silence, following Tristan's reflexive curse. She took in the whole of the room, and the worry lines in her forehead deepened. "I didn't realize it was going to be so busy today. Are we crashing the party, Joey?"

Joey opened his mouth to answer, torn between being polite and yelling _Yes, fuck yes, get out while ya still can! Pregnant ladies and children first!_ Just then the store attendant appeared, reassured everyone and disappeared yet again into the back with Tristan and Serenity's orders, rendering any protest moot.

"…Guess we're all kinda stuck here," Joey finished, followed with an uneasy laugh. He took silent stock of the situation: the three guys knew the score, at least one girl (Téa) in it up to her eyebrows, one girl (Mai) who was probably knew _something_ was up by now, judging by the fingernails leaving red crescents in his skin, and three more girls (Erin and Serenity and the poor harassed store clerk) who probably didn't have a fucking clue what was going on.

And he was still in his tux. Dammit.

Duke felt like a caged animal. Not only was the room filled with the two people he wanted to see _least_ and their assorted entourage, but _now_ , with Erin standing just a few steps past the door, there was no chance for a hasty exit without potentially shoving a very pregnant woman out of the way. The tension gauge needle was firmly stuck in the red, and Téa was still in her evening dress. Fate had decided he was only allowed to be happy in thirty-second increments. To hell with this. To hell with _everything_.

Stuck between the proverbial rock and a hard place, Duke caught sight of Serenity and paused. Téa caught him looking and beat him to the punch. She hooked a finger in his beltloop the moment his weight shifted. "You're _not_."

It was too late. Joey and Tristan both caught Duke looking at Serenity; Duke smelled blood in the water and was desperate for a way out. He had _one_ weapon always at the ready in his arsenal.

"Relax," Duke said smoothly, lips curling up into an arch smirk that two years ago would have made Téa recoil, "I know what I'm doing." He started to pull away again.

Téa debated her options. Struggling with him might cause a scene – though she was pretty sure she could take him.

On the other hand, if she didn't stop him before he opened his mouth, he was _definitely_ going to cause a scene, one that could potentially get all three boys tossed from the store.

Duke _did_ know what he was doing. That was what Téa was afraid of.

She released his belt loop and grabbed his arm. "You said they must think you're an awful person and you use people," Téa hissed, feeling his muscles go tight under her hands, "so do it, and you're proving them right."

Duke wheeled back on her, the smooth smile vanishing beneath a dangerous dark glare. "Maybe they are," he hissed back. In a moment, a blink, the mocking grin reappeared and he pulled away from her completely. In another second she was too far away to make a second grab.

"Serenity!" Duke called with an ingratiating spread of his arms, "Are you going to be at the gala too? That's great, so am I!"

His charm was suffocatin, the result of trying too hard. Serenity didn't know what to say, and neither did the two boys watching the display from too far away to make a difference. She smiled at him, and crossed her arms. "Tristan and Erin brought me here to pick up my dress."

"Why didn't you tell me? I'm hurt!"

He knew he was too close to her when all around him, bodies tensed and hackles raised.

"You knew, I toldja," Joey said quietly, all animation stripped from him.

"She's going with me," Tristan volunteered, and when he moved toward Serenity as well, the tension shifted up another gear. Téa felt like the carpet turned to glue under her bare feet as she tried to get to Duke's side and call him off.

"Tristan, what's going on?" Erin asked, unheeded, concern lacing through her voice.

Serenity looked confused, trying to smile but losing the grip on her confidence when she looked to her right and saw Joey going red and Tristan horribly pale and angry. "Tristan invited me several weeks ago, Duke," she answered, firm and even, "I'm sure they told you, you just must have forgotten."

Duke didn't look up to confirm this with either of the young men moving slowly to flank Serenity. He didn't need to. Nearly a month's worth of practice with Tristan for the purpose of saving Serenity's feet? Of course he knew. If he looked up he'd have only seen Mai's big violet eyes promising bloody death, and the wild storm of hurt and confusion running out of control in Joey's open, honest face. It would have stopped him, and he'd still be trapped.

In another second, the silence was going to break. Tristan was flashing taut rage and another second would satisfy Duke's masochistic self; break loose Tristan's stuck tongue so that Duke could dance insults around him and make a perfect fool of them both when Joey inevitably came to his rescue.

"I would have _rather_ heard it from—" Duke began in an unmistakable voice, moving closer still. Tristan did the same, hurt sliding easily over into shock and anger as Duke shamelessly used Serenity in front of them; forced them to watch the sham.

He got no further.

"Tristan, _stop_ , right now!" Erin ordered and stepped forward, snatching her brother's shoulder.

Téa's fingernails dug into Duke's arm. She yanked him around to face her, surprising him so much by the violence of the action that he didn't struggle to throw her off. They faced one another. Téa's expression was a summary of the pain in all of the faces around him that he'd refused to see.

A few feet away, Joey united fronts with Tristan. Mai caught Serenity's attention and led her to the window display, removing her from the situation entirely. Just like that, Duke's plan was ruined; the awful feeling in the room abated some but not lifted.

Erin released Tristan's shoulder to curl both hands instinctively around her belly. " _What_ is going _on_?"

Nobody answered her.

" **What** are you **doing**?" Téa demanded, angrily.

"I wanna know the same thing," Tristan echoed in a deadly voice. His fists hung white-knuckled at his sides. From his peripheral vision, Duke watched as Joey's fingers slid down Tristan's arm and touched his hand, half-masked by their sleeves and Joey's pant leg. Long fingers stroked the flexing tendons; tickled the skin until Tristan exhaled and loosened his fist. Never gripping, just touching, because Joey _always_ knew what Tristan needed because they'd been together since the fucking _beginning_ …

" **DUKE. DEVLIN.** "

Duke's eyes had wandered fully toward the private display of comfort, and Téa's angry voice snapped them back. He lifted his chin and glowered at her. The raw arrogance snapped something apart between them and Téa reared back with a hard shake of her head. "I'm walking. I'd rather take a bus home than let you take me _anywhere_." She broke away and stalked back to the dressing room without another word.

Duke watched her go, feeling helpless and guilty as hell, and after a few shocked seconds started after her—

"Leave'er _alone_ , Devlin," Joey said in his best traffic-cop voice.

"You did way more than enough," Tristan chimed in.

Duke turned around slowly. "Why don't the two of you just fuck off?" he snarled.

"Don't make me beat your ass."

" _Tristan_!" Erin admonished. For the first time all afternoon, someone listened and the room went silent. The clerk took it as a cue, and was immediately on her way towards the knot of people near the entryway to ask them to leave. It had been a long day already. Young men fighting in the showroom? Two weeks' notice, yes sir, resignation on the manager's desk in the morning.

Erin's resonant voice stopped her in her tracks.

"I don't know _what_ this is all about, and I don't _want_ to know," Erin said, pretty features twisted into a mother's scowl so fearsome and so familiar that everyone under the age of twenty in the room instinctively cringed. "This is a place of _business._ Tristan, you say Mom and Dad don't treat you like an adult? Maybe you should try _acting_ like one."

Tristan looked down. Joey's fingers found his wrist and squeezed in sympathy. Duke saw it, and couldn't help the superior smirk.

"And Mr. Devlin? I'm not sure how people do things where you come from, but around _here_ , that's not how we treat friends."

If that had come from anyone else but a beautiful pregnant woman, Duke would have calmly told them to go to hell. Instead he said nothing, though his chin never lowered a fraction. He looked for Mai by the window, and found no sympathy there. Even Serenity was giving him a wary look.

Today was just not his day.

Satisfied that she'd cowed the assembly, Erin turned back on her brother. "Tristan, get your suit. Once you and Serenity have your out—oh." Both hands flew to her lower back. Hazel eyes went wide and then squeezed closed. "Oh. Oh…okay. Oh."

Joey let go of Tristan's wrist and stepped around his side to see Erin more clearly. "Erin? Y'okay? What's goin' on? S'it th' kid?"

As he was finishing the sentence, Erin's water broke. A second later, _she_ knew, and a few seconds after that _everyone_ knew.

The boutique clerk went pale. Yes sir. Resignation. Quitting, sir, first thing in the morning.

She took a deep breath and stepped into their midst. "Is everything all right?"

"Erin's havin' a baby!" Joey snapped, as if this should already be obvious to the world at large. He took a deep breath and settled. Everything else that had taken place in this room was promptly swept away. "She needs help, couldja call 9-1-1?" he said, while Tristan flanked him to help Erin find a place to sit down.

Eager to get away from the situation completely, the clerk vanished with a harried "Of course, right away!"

Just as the clerk rounded the corner and disappeared through the office door at the back of the boutique, Téa returned from the dressing room, still in her formalwear. Her eyeshadow was smudged, and her eyes and cheeks were red. She looked disheveled as though she'd dressed again in a hurry and dashed towards the commotion, ignoring Duke – who hung back on the sidelines in a state of shock.

"What's going on?"

"Erin's havin' a _baby_!" Joey repeated, "Can people stop askin' that question? Geez."

"The ambulance will be here in twenty minutes!" the clerk announced from the office door.

"Do we have that long?" Tristan asked.

"How far apart are the contractions?" Duke asked patiently, moving – without any unnecessary shoving – to Erin's side. Tristan looked up at him with an expression of gratitude – _Oh, **someone** here knows what they're doing_ – like he was an angel of God. That was about as screwed up as the rest of this godforsaken day. Heh. What do you know. A pun.

Erin was oblivious to most of them, lying flat on the carpet with her head toward the front wall, knees bent and both hands resting on her belly, protecting it. Her breaths were even, but sweat sheened her forehead even on the chilly showroom floor. "Four. Maybe four minutes apart," she said, quietly. "Hurt all day. Thought…just my back…had a headache, just…" Her head rolled to one side, eyes finding Tristan's. "I'm sorry, Tristan."

"It'll be okay," Duke said, and knelt next to Tristan on Erin's right side. "Erin, I think you'll need to push soon." He paused for thought. "This is your second baby, right?"

"Mm," Erin nodded, all of her bluster gone. Tristan watched her face for a few seconds, her closed eyes. She looked alone in the middle of everything. Like nothing could touch her because it hurt so bad.

"My guess is that ambulance won't make it here in time," Duke was saying.

"How the hell d'you know all this?" Joey dropped to his knees on Erin's other side. He glared at Duke suspiciously, then turned to Mai to take the dressing room bench pad that she offered, and tucked it under Erin's head.

"I had a customer give birth in the middle of my store on Christmas Eve," Duke explained, "after that I took classes."

"Just in case," Joey said, sounding faintly awed.

Duke smirked inwardly at the other man's change of attitude. Amazing how fickle the passions could be. "Just in case," he agreed, and focused on Erin.

A few more minutes passed. The clerk stayed on the phone with the dispatcher, grateful to have a legitimate excuse not to interfere. Tristan, Joey and Duke continued to sit with Erin, while the rest of the group perched around the scene like a flock of mismatched birds. Joey realized belatedly that he was _still_ wearing his suit.

Erin spiraled off into another contraction long before even a quarter of the allotted time had passed. The baby would be there long before the ambulance.

"Tell me what to do," Tristan said resolutely. Erin was _his_ sister, her baby was _his_ family, and if this was anyone's responsibility, he was taking charge.

"Take her underwear off."

" _What?_ "

"You didn't think that women give birth in their Victoria's Secret panties, did you? Oh, _don't_ tell me, I don't want to know. Push her skirt up, and pull her underwear off."

"Why me?"

"'Cause you're her _brother_!" Joey said quickly, before anyone could shoehorn _him_ into doing it.

"You know," Erin interrupted the tense argument, maintaining her humor despite her breathless voice, "I could always do it myself." Then she disappeared under the weight of the pain, became something else entirely as her body started straining and imploding, and even if that was a feeling she recognized there was nothing she could do to get around it. Her body was no longer her own.

In the end, nobody remembered who got the panties off, but before the next contraction they were no longer an issue.

"Erin," Duke said quietly, "I think on the next contraction you're going to need to push."

Tristan looked up at him from Erin's hip. Duke looked from him to Joey at her shoulder. The two of them wore identical expressions of childish fear and childish resolution, waiting for orders. In this single moment, he'd become a hero. All sins forgiven.

Great. He'd just keep a pregnant woman around for the next time he screwed up.

"Don't worry. She'll be fine."

"How do you know?" Tristan demanded, "Is she dilated?"

"Tristan, do you _know_ what 'dilated' means?"

"How the fuck should **I** know what 'dilated' means?"

"If she pushes and nothing happens, we'll know she's not dilated. I took a _class_ , that doesn't make me a doctor!"

Erin let out a breath with a whoosh, moaning on the exhale. Her body tensed, and Joey winced as the hand that his had been laced with up 'til now squeezed so hard that the imprint of her wedding band would make a purple bruise across his knuckle.

"Erin, you've gotta push, okay? Joey, make sure she breathes." It had been a while since that class, and Duke felt inordinately stupid, but tried not to let on.

"What? _How_ 'm I—"

"Just tell her. And stay calm."

"Oh. Right." Joey focused his attention on Erin's face as Duke motioned to Tristan to follow him. Erin's skirt was still mostly tented over her knees, and gingerly, Duke lifted it, letting it slide back. "Tristan, you wanna play catch?" Duke asked, in an undertone.

Tristan's attention was _riveted_ on Duke's face, panicked and doing his best not to look at his sister. He couldn't even _think_ the words that went with those girl bodyparts, not to mention _look_ at them. "You mean-?"

"Yeah. Look, just…when the baby crowns—you'll be able to see the head. Just, kind of…make a net. A cradle. With your hands. So it doesn't hit the floor."

Tristan twitched.

"Doesn't _touch_ the floor, sorry. Just hold it when it comes out. Okay? Or should I? If you can't handle it."

"I can handle it," Tristan snapped. He took a deep breath, squinted, and took a long look just to avoid the weirdness. Because if it looked freaking weird _now_ , it was going to get a lot worse in a few minutes.

Not so surprisingly, it did. It took another five minutes of breathe…and _push_ …and _breathe_ , before all of the slimy, wiggly whitish-pinkish baby slid into Tristan's hands. As soon as he felt it, Tristan forgot about where it came out of. Forgot everything else but what it felt like to have the baby in his hands, new, tiny, delicate and _absolutely fricking disgusting_.

The EMT's appeared just in time to save them all from panicking when what Duke delicately called 'the follow-up' was a little slow in finishing. They came in a surge of blue jackets and khaki pants to rescue Erin from the boutique and clean up the aftermath. By then, Duke had already shown Tristan how to cut the umbilical cord – the clerk at _least_ knew where the First-Aid kit was and a pair of sterile scissors – and Erin had been holding her new baby for five minutes.

"It's a girl," one of the EMT's announced, unnecessarily, as she wrapped the baby in a towel and held her until the rest of the crew finished loading Erin's cart into the back of the ambulance.

"We know," Tristan said. He hadn't let the new baby out of his sight since she'd appeared, and was watching her now. Someone from the team had given him a towel to clean off his hands. He was holding onto it, balled against his stomach, until Joey came up to throw an arm around his shoulders.

"We're gonna call 'er Joey," he said, looking as pleased as if he'd fathered the baby himself.

"That's her _middle_ name," Tristan corrected seriously.

"Deidre Joanna. We're'nna call 'er Joey, yanno we are."

"You wish."

From a few feet away, silent and brooding, Duke watched them. He wanted to talk to them; he'd earned the right to. He maybe even wanted to say he was sorry. But somehow walking up to them was harder than it looked.

He felt a light touch on his elbow and turned.

"I still think you were an asshole today," Téa said quietly, lips quirked as though she wasn't quite sure if the words would ache when she said them, "…But you did a good thing."

"Look, I'm really—"

"You didn't have to help them, but you did. I think I understand. It's not okay but—given everything you've had to deal with, I'm giving you a pass for _today._ "

Duke laughed, breathing out on the sound and not quite meeting her eyes. "Is this where I'm supposed to say thank you?"

"No, this is where you apologize to those two. While you've still got a pass."

That did it. He was definitely putting an ad in Sunday's paper. _Wanted: Pregnant women to volunteer their time and effort to save Duke Devlin's ass._

"Can I still take you home?" Duke asked, as Téa was moving away. She gestured to the dress that was dangling over her opposite arm and nodded, then headed in the direction of his car. Her flip-flops scraped across the pavement in cadence.

Alone now, Duke went back to his vigil. Ready. He was ready. He was brave enough for this. Only…

They were gone.

"C'mon, Serenity, Mai's goin' home an' Tristan an' me, we're goin' after Erin. We're gonna drop you off home before we go," Joey was saying behind him, voice resonant and free as sun once again. All of the tension seemed to have burned off the minute they walked from the boutique into the oppressive summer air.

Duke turned around and faced them. They slowed to a stop in front of him.

Not for the first time, he couldn't think of a thing to say. Maybe whatever it was _they_ had was contagious. "Look, about today—"

He got no further, as Tristan slammed into him for an unabashed hug.

* * *

Evening fell on Friday under a brilliant red-gold sky. After Tristan's parents arrived at the hospital, Tristan took Joey on his motorcycle down to the docks. Twenty after eight found the two boys sitting at the end of the pier, crosslegged, shoulders gently touching as they watched the sun drop into the water. The sky was a thing of beauty, with violet creeping up the bowl at their backs, and a torn field of clouds reflecting the dying coppers and pinks overhead.

"You know…every time I see one of these skies, it makes me think the world's ending."

"Mm," Joey reported, leaning a little more into Tristan's shoulder and following his gaze to the vibrant red underbellies of the clouds. Deeper in, their layers changed from red to peach and violet and blue-gray. He liked watching the color go out of them.

"Did you hear what I said?"

"Yeah. Keep going."

"I remember, for as _long_ as I can remember…watching the red go away and thinking, 'This is it. This is one more day gone.'" Tristan picked invisible lint from his jeans and tossed it into the water for the sake of something to throw. "It makes me sad."

"That's kinda depressing."

"You don't think it too? This is another day gone before school starts. Another day gone before the leaves drop and it starts snowing, and then another year goes away."

"Nope. Thanks for ruining a perfectly good sunset, though."

"You're starting to sound like Duke."

A month ago, Joey might have bristled. Instead, a slow grin split his lips wide, exposing a row of teeth that wetly reflected the apricot sky. The high points of his features were rosy with the light, cool shadow blue beneath his brows and the underside of his jaw. He laughed, and dropped his cheek on Tristan's shoulder. "I don't get what you mean, though. Why d'you think about that stuff? Summer's not over yet."

"Sure…" Tristan agreed, accepting the weight of Joey's head without moving, "I guess…" He looked down at his companion, then quickly back out at the sky. The sun had vanished, and now the clouds nearest the horizon were golden, the ones above their heads dark, striated blue. "I guess maybe I just don't like losing time."

"So don't lose anymore," Joey snorted. He raised his head, and tossed his bangs quickly from his eyes with a jerk. "It's still pretty," Joey pointed out.

They listened to the white noise of the water and the humming traffic behind them for a few minutes, and watched the fire in the clouds slowly die. Tristan's mind picked up where Joey left off, busy now with thoughts besides the painted sky.

_Don't lose any more time. Don't lose anymore._

_We're making it harder than it really is._

The end of the world turned yellow-orange, and Tristan slipped his arm behind Joey, starting to smile now. "You're right, it is pretty."

Right above the orange was the prettiest shade of green, and pale blue above that. The whole picture at the end of the pier looked like a colorized print from the window of the camera shop.

"We'd better head back to the hospital," Tristan said at last, leaning back on his hands and tucking his heels up on the edge of the pier, "Mom and Dad's gonna wonder where we went. Besides...we can't stay up all night." He turned, to see Joey looking at him curiously. "We've got a party to crash tomorrow night, remember?"

For a minute, Joey studied his expression. Then his features brightened, and he bobbed his head once. They got to their feet, heading back to the end of the dock and the motorcycle waiting on the pavement.


	20. Chapter 20

Mai's family was notorious for displaying their wealth on a grand scale, and when Saturday evening came they certainly didn't disappoint. Outside the world was on fire, bright streaks of lightning unzipping the dark while thunder crackled overhead. Inside, the Valentine great hall was rich with tables dressed in deep blue and silver. Mounds of white chrysanthemums piled in silver bowls at the center of each. A banner hung beneath the chandelier, glowing with the dull sheen of velvet and an embroidered silver crest. A _college_ crest. _Mai's_ college!

"What the hell," Tristan whispered over Joey's shoulder, jerking his chin up to draw Joey's attention to the ceiling and the crest. Joey followed his gaze, head turning slowly to keep staring at it as he and Mai skirted the edge of the hall, Tristan and Serenity following.

"Dammit, Mai, whyn't ya tell me this was for you?" Joey demanded, turning back to his date.

Mai shrugged, smooth bare shoulders moving independently from her heavily embroidered bodice. "You didn't ask? Why does it matter? It's just junior college."

"'Cause ya don't graduate every day! I woulda—" Joey looked down at the starched white shirt and silky blue cummerbund he wore beneath his tuxedo, "—Okay, so I'm already dressed up. I woulda done _something_ for ya!"

"What, bought me a candy necklace?" Mai teased, and patted Joey's arm when he swung around to pin her with an offended glare.

"I'm _not_ a kid."

Mai smiled indulgently, the expression fading as she turned away. Tristan and Serenity moved abreast of Joey and Mai, Tristan on Mai's left now, and though Joey was too busy with his spluttering outrage to notice, Tristan saw the downward flicker of her glossy mouth.

He leaned toward her, ignoring the anxiety that always grabbed at his gut when he stood in the young woman's presence. "That was—"

Violet eyes turned, lovely and terrible, rimmed with dark eyeliner and shadow. They glowed bright in the dim spangling light of the room, and the cool dispassion he saw there warned him off. Her dress was the color of the banner on the ceiling; the blue tablecloths; the frosting trimming the cake on the buffet. She seemed as much a part of the décor as the chrysanthemums in their silver bowls; just as expensive and untouchable.

Tristan flinched under her gaze and shook his head. "Never mind, it was dumb."

For a moment, Mai's pitiless eyes seemed to soften. She turned quickly away. "Excuse me," Mai said, untangled her arm from Joey's and stepped out to meet her parents. Her tinkling jewelry made a soft patter of sound against the click of heels on the marble floor.

Tristan's hand closed around Serenity's wrist, and drew her with him to Joey's side. Joey watched Mai disappear, his expression alternately stunned and stricken. He seemed barely aware of their presence when both Serenity and Tristan flanked him and slipped an arm around his waist.

"Was it just me, or did she seem weird to you?" Tristan asked in an undertone. Joey shook his head, soft at first, slowly, and then with more energy. His whole posture was slumped, hands eventually finding their way into his pockets to bunch the hem of his jacket.

"Naw," Joey sighed in a defeated tone, "she's just doin' what she's gotta do. Can't figure out what this forfeit was all about anyway; not like she'd hafta trick me, to get me to go out with her. Er." He noticed Tristan's long stare, and shook his head, apologizing sincerely for the misstep with his gaze, "Before, anyway."

Tristan, not all that unsettled by the comment to begin with, nodded in understanding.

They found their seats; the tables within the grand hall flowed around an open dance floor, the place settings at each marked with a tiny filigreed pewter easel and a placecard bearing a name. Joey, Tristan and Serenity all found their cards at the same table, near the disc jockey's booth.

" _I'm_ just happy there's no symphony," Joey said, bending over his own place setting to examine his name on the stiff embossed linen card. 'Joseph Wheeler,' it read. Joey's nose wrinkled. "She's laughin' at me," he said quietly.

"Orchestra," Tristan corrected, circling the table after he'd found his own card. There were three places still open. Presumably one was left for Mai, but who were the other two?

"Whatever," Joey plucked his card from the easel and turned it over in the palm of his hand, "wonder if we get to keep these."

"Téa's sitting with us," Serenity reported, standing on the furthest arc of the table. She smiled up at her startled companions, the expression quickly fading as she read their faces. "…What? Her card's right here, next to Tristan's."

Quickly, Tristan reached for the card he'd been about to examine when she spoke. Sure enough, the leftover seat was Duke's. He looked up to meet Joey's waiting gaze, and nodded with a heavy shrug. "Yup. It's them."

"Man, this's startin' to feel like one of those MTV shows, like any minute now somebody's gonna tell us 'you got punked,' Tris," Joey replied, turning away from him, hips and fingertips lightly pressed against the edge of the table. "But I got no idea why Mai'd wanna punk me, and I don't get _how_ she'd punk me, anyway."

"You think it's a setup?" Tristan suggested, joining him. Serenity reached Joey's other side. That was the way it went since he met her, Tristan thought suddenly; Serenity on Joey's right, Tristan on his left. The two of them sidled up to Joey, unasked and unwanted (but necessary) supports, not quite meeting but still sort of together anyway. He'd never noticed before.

"Dunno," Joey said. He poked both hands into his pockets again. "Something doesn't feel right. Why'd she invite me if she was just gonna spend all night over _there_ anyway?" Joey's left wrist jerked restlessly in his pocket as he remembered not to point, and thrust his chin in Mai's direction instead. She played the gracious, smiling hostess across the room, nearly melted into the scenery in her matching sapphire costume, but no amount of velvet-and-embroidery camouflage could conceal her bright blonde hair.

Tristan thought of how Mai looked at him earlier. He risked looping an arm briefly around Joey's shoulders. "Because she's supposed to be over there, I think," Tristan said. He felt Joey start inside his grip, then sag against him a little as the veil of aggravation wore off and Joey understood what he should have guessed all along.

"Remind me not to treat _my_ kids like that when I'm a millionaire," Joey grunted.

Tristan laughed.

The hall filled rapidly now with bright voices and the swish of taffeta as the gala guests found their tables and took their seats. The DJ returned to his booth and now the fast strains of a Viennese waltz swept from one end of the room to the other. In the lull, Joey volunteered to forage cups of soda for the three of them before a line had time to form…wherever the bar happened to be. He vanished into the crowd, blending in with an ease that he'd never manage without his rented tux and neatly-combed hair.

No sooner had he disappeared, but Duke and Téa joined Tristan and Serenity at the table. Tristan greeted them, surprised. "Where's the fanfare?" he asked, leaning into Téa as she came forward and wrapped her arms around him for a brief hug.

"I downsized my entourage budget," Duke replied. His smile was as surprised as Tristan's when Duke looked up from gently clasping Serenity's hand. "You made it after all, huh?"

"Couldn't let all my hard work and suffering go to waste," Tristan grinned.

"Speaking of suffering, where's the other Bobsey Twin?" Duke asked, craning his neck as he searched the crowd. "I see Mai playing Queen of the Ball, but I don't see Joey."

"He's raiding the bar," Tristan said casually, "I hear they're not carding."

 _Bullshit,_ Duke grinned. He circled behind Téa's waiting chair and drew it out. "Tristan, this is the _social elite_. If you're under twenty-one and your parents aren't rich enough to send you a limousine, you shouldn't be here." He paused, reconsidering his statement. "You want something, though? I could take you home." The tone of his voice held a tint of the something it missed since the day at the hospital. Tristan felt a tiny electric thrill.

" _I_ do," Téa interrupted, curling both arms around Duke's arm once she'd set her purse on the table at her spot, "Duke, I didn't spend all that time and energy on you because I wanted to be a wallflower. _Dance_ with me." She stepped away again, to Tristan's relief – because the image of Téa clinging to _anyone's_ arm, even in play, was just weird as hell – and extended her hand to her dance partner instead.

Laughing, Duke slipped his hand into Téa's, bringing it in to tuck into the fold of his arm. "Duty calls," he said lightly across his shoulder, and swept Téa out into the sea of swirling skirts. Tristan turned back to Serenity, shaking his head, to find her accepting a small plastic cup of clear carbonated soda from Joey's overburdened hands.

"They must teach waltzin' in finishin' school, s'all I gotta say," Joey said, pointing towards the busy dance floor with one elbow as he held up the remaining two glasses for Tristan to choose from, "Mountain Dew or Coke, take your pick. Cheap bastards, no A&W."

"As a matter of fact, they _do_ teach the Viennese waltz in finishing school, Joey," Mai's voice drifted over Tristan's shoulder like a silk scarf and both boys swung to look at her in surprise. "But those are mostly professionals my mother hired."

Tristan lifted his eyebrows as he held away the slightly drippy glass of Mountain Dew before it stained his tux. " _Geez_ , Mai, when will people quit sneaking up on me? Do I look like I scare easy, or something?"

"You don't," Mai said, "that's half the fun." She winked, tilting her head a little on her swannish neck, as if their earlier exchange never happened. She spread both hands "I don't suppose Duke told you that I _can_ dance, did he?" She paused to let the words take the desired effect, then went on, "well, I can. Of course, finishing school is…well…let's just say that there are certain _do_ and _don't_ activities, but I can waltz, I can foxtrot, tango _rather_ well I think…and definitely handle the Viennese waltz."

"That's great," Joey shot back, "you go find a partner who can do all those, 'cause all I can do is waltz."

"I whipped your ass in Duel Monsters, Joseph Wheeler, you can Viennese waltz if I _say_ you can."

"I bet they didn't teach _that_ in finishing school!" Tristan laughed.

"It's not that different from the steps of the waltz…it's just faster, that's all. It's older, if you care." Mai offered her hand to her reluctant dance partner. When Joey continued to hesitate, Mai's gaze flickered to Tristan. "I could always dance with—"

"I'm game," Joey said shortly, catching where her glance went, and latched onto her partially extended hand before either of them could have second thoughts. He glanced over his shoulder once – at Tristan, who smirked and made a tiny 'shooing' motion with one hand – before the carousel of flying skirts caught them up and they blended into the motion on the dance floor. The music swelled – Tristan vaguely remembered it from a dance lesson or two – and quieted, slipping back into a delicate roll of merry-go-round strings.

"Ohh, Tristan, _look!_ " Serenity shored up the distance between her side and her escort's, and caught his attention as she pointed into the midst of the swirling dancers. He darted a surprised, slightly guilty look in her direction, before he followed the line of her extended arm and found Téa and Duke. Most of the dresses in the assembly were soft, feathered pastels – Téa's deeply rosy skirts were as easy to spot and follow as an iris in a bouquet of carnations.

Tristan watched, transfixed, realizing as they swayed and turned to the grandiose strains of formal music that—he'd never seen the two dance _together_ until tonight. Duke was so good that he seemed almost invisible, pleased to be a backdrop for Téa's sweeps and poses. She moved with natural grace, dancing circles around the floor, around Duke, as if the bright, ancient Strauss waltz had been written only to display her gift.

Joey's moment of epiphany came yesterday. Tristan took his now. She made him want to hold his breath, now that he understood the difficulty of her perfection, how _hard_ she worked to get here. He wished Yugi was here to see this, share this with, instead of so far away. But even gone for the summer, Tristan would bet the fifty he didn't have that Yugi already knew. Probably knew way before the rest of them figured it out.

"She's a great dancer, isn't she?" Tristan said, to Serenity…but mostly to himself.

"She's going to be famous," Serenity replied, and in a flash of prescience, imagined or not, Tristan believed she was right. He saw Téa in one of those poofy dresses too, pastel pink, marabou swishing against her long legs as she flew around the floor at some big competition.

She _was_ going to be famous someday. Gratitude welled up as Tristan realized what a gift she'd given him. "She taught me to dance, you know," Tristan said, looking away to grin at the top of Serenity's head. She looked up at him, big brown Wheeler eyes bright and preoccupied. She wanted to dance too, he could see it, but he didn't know how to do this one—

Oh, hell. Téa didn't spend all that time and effort on him so he could be a wallflower. The floor was crowded – the better dancers took the outside, but it seemed relatively safe towards the middle. "Wanna stumble through one with me?" Tristan offered the younger girl his arm in an overdone show of gallantry. She took it, they smiled at one another, and ducked onto the dance floor.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later, flushed with exertion and excitement, everyone returned to the table and their seats – sans Mai, of course, expected to appear at the head table with her parents for the initial speech to open the dinner pageantry. To Tristan's surprise, Joey insisted upon escorting the young woman back to her parents, and returned with a look of triumph.

To the uninitiated, the gala took on the novel appearance of a theatrical production. Servers threaded among the tables, offering shallow bowls of soup. Tristan regarded the thick orange-yellow liquid dubiously. "What is this?"

Duke volunteered to be the first victim to sample the first course. Joey looked on enviously, then lowered his gaze to the dizzying array of silverware. Joey darted a glance at Téa to his right, who hadn't yet picked up a spoon, and Mai's chair on his left was empty. Wait. He knew this one. Hadn't there been a movie somewhere that hinted at this? Joey checked to be sure nobody looked at him, then lifted the handle of the longest fork, checking for a number, a symbol, a corresponding name. Of course, the handles were all blank. He huffed. C'm _aaahn_ , he was hungry and shouldn't have to decode his dinner forks! Unless this was what bored rich people did for fun?

Tristan spied Joey's indecision, watched him for a few seconds, then leaned sideways over Mai's empty seat. By habit and reflex, Joey leaned toward him to catch whatever he had to say. "Titanic," Tristan muttered in an undertone, masked beneath the instrumental strains still rolling across the great hall.

Joey blinked, frowned at Tristan and raised his eyebrows. 'Titanic?' What the hell was _that_ cryptic shit supposed to mean?

"It's roasted red pepper soup," Duke reported, brandishing his empty spoon like a Campbell's ad, "it's _really_ good. If you like that sort of thing."

"How the hell do you know all this random shit?" Joey directed his hungry irritation at Duke instead of his plate. "You can't see the peppers, how do you know they're roasted?"

"I just know," Duke replied, airy and smug.

"Guess that gaydar of yours must not scan the control tower?" Joey retorted after a pause, and around the table hands flew to stifle explosive giggles. A middle-aged woman in a snowy fox stole seated behind Joey turned to look at him in shock. Tristan ducked toward his soup, using the flower arrangement in the center of the table as camouflage, and when Joey looked his way he once again mouthed the word 'Titanic.' Urgently, he set down his spoon at the outermost edge of the silverware, then picked it up again.

 _'Start on the outside and work your way in,'_ Joey heard in the back of his mind. There _had_ been a movie! Not one he'd admit he watched, of course… Joey straightened, then beamed, and mouthed the word silently back at Tristan as he raised the appropriate spoon on his own side of the table. _'Titanic!'_

Tristan nodded slowly, a smile replacing his earlier anxious frown. Both young men looked up to see the rest of the table regarding them with curiosity. Squat bowls of chrysanthemums made poor cover, as it turned out.

"Share with the class?" Duke asked, dryly.

"Nope," Tristan said blithely.

"Boring guy shit," Joey added. Fox-stole-woman cleared her throat with a touch of distress, and Serenity laid a warning hand on her older brother's arm. Joey continued to smile, recalcitrant, but nevertheless made an extra effort to curb his language.

The second course came, and the evening swept on with the clink of glassware and the swirl of ballgowns over the temporary dance floor. Tristan could see that Joey was bored by the fifth balding, middle-aged stuffshirt who stood up to offer a lengthy treatise of congratulations and well wishes for the future. To Tristan, this felt more like a wedding than a graduation party, and he said so in a careful undertone. Everyone else at the table seemed just as puzzled by the observation, except for Duke.

"It's a power play," he said, dutifully keeping his voice low to keep the conversation at the table and away from the likes of Fox-stole-woman. "Mai doesn't have a lot of relatives. So who do you think all these people are?"

"Mama Valentine's business associates?" Tristan suggested.

Duke nodded. "Clients, a couple vendors, some local partners, maybe even a carefully chosen enemy or two. I think this is more about Mrs. Valentine's company _doing well_ than Mai graduating college."

"Plus, it's an awfully big to-do for junior college," Téa added thoughtfully, "especially since Mai's starting in the fall at Wake Forest." At this, Joey shot her a _how-did-you-know-that_ frown. His pensive expression went unnoticed as the others cast surreptitious glances in Mai's direction, her expensive dress still tastefully accompanying the wallhangings and the centerpieces. They all knew that the party was no more for her than Wake Forest University was chosen because she _wanted_ to go there.

"Bet you all ten bucks they even made her go to college here first, because her mother wants her to have a local degree along with all the 'big city learnin.' Yanno. Small town pride and all that. _'Da-na-na-na-na-small-town, da-na-na-na-na-small-town,'_ " Duke said, ending with a few derisive bars of the annoyingly ubiquitous Bruce Springsteen song.

"So everything here is one big business maneuver," Tristan summed up, sounding awed. As if he repeated the sentence simply to drive it home, incomprehensible as it was. Nobody teased him for stating the obvious, because really, everyone else was thinking it too. Somewhere between meeting Mai for the first time in Duelist Kingdom and _now_ , she'd become just another one of them. Now, they were reminded of reality outside the forced equality of the game, and just how different things were for her.

If Joey Wheeler was a fan of extended thought process, he might have had a little sympathy for Seto Kaiba while he was at it. Unfortunately, he was busy being indignant.

"So _that's_ why she brought me," Joey said sharply. Everyone else – including Duke – looked at him with surprise. When he spoke next, his voice and posture were defiant. "Betcha her parents said she could invite… like… ten people herself. Figuring she'd stick to the 'right' people, yanno?" In his need to spin the words out, Joey missed the tight shift of his listeners' expressions as Mai approached the table from behind him. They could only watch and try frantically to signal to him as he stared at his plate.

"And I'm not one of the right people, and I look like a punk, and I _am_ a punk, and so's Tris, but we're safe. Safe as in, she knows I'll piss off her folks just by being here, but we're not gonna get drunk or set the place on fire. So basically me being here is just a big friggin' middle finger to Mom and Pop, over there." Joey took a breath. Finally, he looked up, read the expressions around him and their eyes pinned to the same spot over his head. He paled a little. "She's right behind me, isn't she."

"I won't deny I get some satisfaction out of it," Mai's voice was cool, her expression impassive as he swiveled in his chair, "that I could show my mother my _real_ friends, not the ones they'd like to pick out for me. But it gets old, being on display, and it's nice to have a table of people I can _talk_ to."

"Don't believe ya," Joey persisted, earning himself shocked stares from his companions, "why'd you invite me? We don't even talk that much. You spend more time with _him_ ," he waved at Duke, "and _she_ knows more about ya." Joey repeated the gesture, now in Téa's direction. Tristan, Duke and Téa looked at him with quickly hidden sympathy, hearing the aggravation at his own blindness. June had been a month of revelations for everyone, some less pleasant than others.

Mai let out a carefully controlled breath. "Why does it matter to you so much? Is it impossible that I might honestly like you _all_ enough to invite? We don't read our diaries to each other over the phone, Joseph Wheeler, but we're hardly strangers."

"I guess so," Joey said, sullen.

"You're a hell of a duelist," Mai said firmly, keeping her back turned on Fox-stole-woman even as the little disapproving "hm!" could be heard, "and I respect you more than you probably deserve, and I like having you around. Is that a crime?" If she left out, _'and a dear friend has the hots for you and Tristan, and I was setting you up a little,_ ' Mai expected she could be forgiven. What they don't know can't hurt them, and all that. After all, as she said the words she realized that she genuinely meant every one. "If I haven't mortally wounded your pride by making my parents squirm some, then I'd _like_ to hang out more often. With all of you," she added quickly, before Tristan coughed and Joey blushed and Duke would have to temporize something to cover their asses. She knew, of course, but they didn't _know_ that she knew.

The table was quiet as everyone absorbed Mai's words. Téa and Tristan drew breath simultaneously to fill the silence, overrunning each other with acceptances of the invitation just a shade too eager. Joey said nothing, but turned back around in his chair after she left, refusing to look at the others for a few minutes. The discomfort ratcheted up another notch.

"Joey, could I—" Tristan began slowly, sliding back from the table. Joey shoved his chair back and bolted after Mai, leaving Tristan dangling mid-sentence and halfway between sitting and standing. He shared a wry smile with the rest of the table, and continued getting up.

"Duty calls," Tristan said, and followed before anyone could stop him.

He felt somehow exposed as he walked among the tables of the elite, even in his rented tuxedo. It felt like these people could see through his thin armor, and knew he didn't belong there. Tightening his jaw a little, Tristan trudged with more determination after Joey. He slipped through the double doors he'd seen Joey vanish through, and followed him down a dimly lit tile hallway. It somehow seemed important that he didn't give away his position, so he kept his motions quiet and didn't call after the two ahead of him. Ahead was yet another pair of doors (apparently the rich liked doors in twos, Tristan thought with a flash of faint amusement), this set mostly glass, displaying the porch beyond. When he pushed through, the humidity of the night hit him in a rush, followed by a blast of cool, wet air heavy with the scent of storm. He spotted Mai and Joey in a flash of faraway lightning, already talking intently at the end of the porch. Their voices were steady, not at all the angry bickering he'd expected. Tristan backed up, letting the doors close as he moved inside again.

Tristan took a deep breath of blissfully cool indoor air, and headed back to reassure everyone that Joey wasn't going to die tonight.

* * *

The porch was dark, obviously not meant to invite the rest of the party guests outside. Joey nearly collided with a potted topiary of some kind as he walked along the railing of the porch to reach the swing where she'd taken refuge.

"Mai, I'm sorry. Look, I didn't know," he said.

"Joey, it's fine. I came out here to get a little air away from everyone, so—if you could just—" Mai's voice was mild, not angry, not tight, not any of the things he expected. But Mai wasn't one to pull dramatics. Joey knew that. His brightest lasting memories of her were from Duelist Kingdom. About to fall out of that tube top, Bonnie Raitt hair, Mae West lips. She could be sneaky, taunting and cruel - but melodramatics couldn't be included in her list of flaws. He thought she maybe had a little bit of a martyr complex, but set against Duke's, it was a sniffle compared to walking pneumonia.

She was gorgeous in the dim light, sitting in the padded porch swing with her heels off and her feet tucked up under her pretty butt. Even an idiot like him could pick that up. Joey was gratified, at least, to notice that he felt bad because she was his friend and he'd hurt her, and not because he'd probably screwed his chances of scoring with a hot chick.

He spared a little note of humor in knowing that if he was Tristan, he'd feel guilty for just noticing she was a hot chick and thinking automatically about scoring. Dude had a problem. They needed to work on that.

"I know I insulted ya, though. I think. Felt like I did, anyway. I didn't mean to, I'm just a stupid—"

Joey came around the swing to look at her head-on, "what I said before—"

Mai sighed. Joey knew a verbal eyeroll when he heard one. She'd told him once not to apologize, but he could be just as stubborn as she could, dammit, and it was important to remind her.

"I just don't get why you stick around," Joey pressed. He could barely breathe in this humidity, and sweat already filmed his skin. Why couldn't Mai have picked a cooler place to run off? "But that don't mean I got any business thinking you're running us. And for the record, I don't think you are," as the words came forward, Joey realized with relief that he meant them. He didn't know Mai nearly as well as he thought he should, but he really, _really_ wanted to believe her. Enough, apparently, to tamp down his own fears.

Silence fell between them, thinner and less charged than the humidity, and Joey knelt slowly in front of Mai to meet her gaze without forcing her to look up. The whites of her eyes flickered in the dark as she glanced at him, and then her teeth. Mai patted the bench beside her. "So obviously, you aren't going to leave. Sit up here, you dope. This isn't church."

Joey did as she asked, cautiously staying as far to the opposite end of the swing as he could. Silence descended again, broken only by the rising wind and peals of thunder. A few tendrils of cooler air reached them, carrying the scent of rain.

"Joey, I know you and I have very different families," Mai began tentatively, "and I know things aren't great for you—"

"Cut that out," Joey replied in a flat voice, "Mom don't want me around and Dad's wasted allatime. Don't make me a charity case. You got troubles too. Yugi, Tris, Téa, everybody does." He realized too late that his cool, sharp response had taken Mai back, and huffed. "Sorry," he said, awkward again.

"You know what it's like to feel unwanted, then," Mai began again, after a minute or two of quiet, "I don't have that. Not... quite the same. Mother _wants_ me, but I think she wants me in the same way she wants her New England townhouse, or her Sony stock." Joey's puzzled expression must have conveyed itself to her obviously enough. Mai sighed, folded her arms, and added, "Do you know what my graduation gift was? An interest in the business. A board position."

"She must trust you," Joey mused, too shocked by the revelation to say anything else.

Mai laughed. He could hear the rustle of her hair as she shook her head. "Trust doesn't figure. Your townhouse is _going_ to be a townhouse. You go to bed, you wake up, knowing that it's going to be a townhouse when you get there, because it just **is**. You don't have to trust it because it doesn't have an option to be anything else."

"You got options!"

Another laugh, this one quieter and strained; almost lost beneath the thunder. "I never said I didn't. I said that's what she thinks. I know my mother. She doesn't know me."

Straining Mai's monologue for relevant information, Joey felt asea. "How'd you manage that AND keep her thinking you're still a townhouse?" he asked, adding "...in New England," just to hear her laugh.

"Very carefully," Mai replied. "Joey, most of my life, I knew what it was like to want things. Not _care_ about them. I did things because I wanted to get away from my mother, because I didn't want to spend my life showing houses and running a company. That's how I got to Duelist Kingdom. You're my first real friends. You want me around because I'm me, without any expectations." She leaned back, rolling her slender shoulders. "That's why I put up with you goofballs. You'd care if anything happened to me. You wouldn't just… adjust your plans."

The words got out of Joey's mouth before he could stop them. "We miss ya. You were around every other day forever, seemed like. Now you're a million miles away over here in Candyland. It's like trying to see the Pope."

Joey could almost feel Mai's smile in the dark. He regretted the admission a little less.

"Well, I'm done with college for the summer, at least. I'll be around until August." She unfolded her arms, palms lifted. "I'll probably humor Mother, work here with her for a while. Why not? Put some more money away for my great escape – since you and Yugi made off with my exit strategy the last time."

A crack of lightning less than a mile away distracted them both, the sharp-edged boom following the flash making both Joey and Mai sit up and peer anxiously towards the garden.

"Better get inside," Joey said.

"You go," Mai nudged him, then made shooing motions with her hands - only vaguely visible now. "I'll catch up."

"But Mai, it's swelterin' out here! Plus it's gonna start rainin' ponies and airedales any minute."

"I'm—what's that phrase—'sweating like a pig,' Joey. When I go inside I'm going straight up to my room to clean up. No boys allowed. Now _get_."

The return of Mai's flirtatious tone of voice and manner was soothing to Joey, somehow. He went, with the feeling that more had been settled besides his guilty conscience.


End file.
